— son of Guyana’s first COVID victim

TODAY, March 11, marks exactly one year since Guyana recorded its first case and the first death caused by the novel coronavirus. Ratna Baboolall, a 52-year-old woman, was that first victim. Since then, not a single day has gone by without Suraj Baboolall, Ratna’s son, thinking about his mother.

Suraj and his family had returned to Guyana from the United States of America (USA) early March, but his mother developed symptoms of the disease and later succumbed at the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation (GPHC), on March 11. Suraj and two of his relatives were among the eight persons who recovered after coming into contact with the index patient, Ratna Baboolall.

“There isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t think about her and wonder what would’ve happened if she didn’t die,” Suraj said in an interview with the Guyana Chronicle, ahead of the ‘COVID Anniversary’.

Suraj noted that the family took all precautions before travelling to Guyana, since the virus had already spread to the US. When the family travelled to Guyana in March, 2020, however, they did not know the devastation that would follow.

On March 11, also, the World Health Organisation (WHO) declared the spread of the coronavirus a pandemic, in light of its continued devastation around the world. There seemed to be no stopping the virus, which originated in Wuhan, China in December 2019.

During that year, Suraj said he found himself feeling both stressed and depressed many days. Depressed, naturally, because he lost his mom and stressed, because he believes that persons are not taking the necessary precautions to safeguard from a preventable disease.

“What is frustrating is that people are not taking this as seriously as they should and that literally frightens me,” he said, adding, “I saw thousands of really good people just dying in the US.”

And, he opined that persons seem to be intent on flouting the COVID-19 guidelines in place to mitigate the spread of the virus. Suraj contended that persons may not take the virus seriously unless they lose a loved one, like he did.

“I’m trying to cope with it and not get angry,” Suraj said. However, it is not such an easy feat to control his anger and frustration. In fact, it is something that he and his relatives have to work through in therapy.

Despite this, he highlighted, “Everytime I see a mother die from corona, I think about mine. I think about how it could have been prevented.”

There have been 8,928 cases of COVID-19 recorded in Guyana but 8,211 persons have recovered. Guyana has also had 205 deaths so far. Worldwide, there have been 118 million cases and 2.6 million deaths.

Now, one year later, there seems to be some light at the end of the tunnel… at least eventually. This hope has manifested in the form of vaccines, which were developed in record time.

“I think the vaccine is one of the better innovations that we can take… It’s one that gonna make you safer and that is what I am excited about,” Suraj highlighted.

Minister of Health Dr. Frank Anthony acknowledged that there are some persons who are skeptical about taking vaccines because of concerns over the pace at which they were developed, long term effects and whether they are more than just a temporary fix.

“The thing here is once we immunize that substantial part of our population, things will change in a radical way,” Dr. Anthony affirmed, however.

“We will have to maintain distance and masks but the key thing here is we are working to immunize the population.

“Vaccines have been proven to do a very effective job. The reason why we have children surviving a lot of childhood illnesses is because of vaccination. We have seen it saving millions of lives,” Dr. Anthony said.