The Tribune

By TANYA SMITH-CARTWRIGHT

tsmith-cartwright@tribunemedia.net

HEALTH officials who recently sounded the alarm on the low supplies of vaccines left in the country can breathe a sigh of relief as authorities in the Pan American Health Organization are promising the arrival of 57,300 doses in the first week of November.

Recently Dr Merceline Dahl-Regis, chairwoman of the National Vaccine Consultative Committee, said The Bahamas faced rapidly diminishing COVID-19 vaccine supplies due to increased demand. She also said vaccine hesitancy remains among a portion of the population.

There are 104,380 people in The Bahamas who are now fully vaccinated.

Yesterday, PAHO Assistant Director Dr Jarbas Barbosa gave an update on how the organisation will help The Bahamas get more vaccines, with the United States assisting indirectly as well.

“PAHO is doing everything that’s possible to increase the access of its member states to vaccines,” Dr Barbosa said during PAHO’s weekly press conference. “In the case of The Bahamas we are working to expedite the process with COVAX. So The Bahamas will receive another 57,300 doses in the first week of November.

“We are also working with the US government to expedite the donation of four million doses that the US government is donating to the Caribbean countries and The Bahamas will receive vaccines through this initiative.

“We are offering the regional countries to complement their vaccines through our direct purchasing process using PAHO’s revolving fund.”

The COVID-19 Delta variant has been identified as the dominant strain in The Bahamas recently leading to skyrocketing COVID numbers, as well as increased deaths rates and hospital cases over the summer. However in recent weeks, the number of COVID-19 infections as well as the hospital rate has lowered. Local officials say it is too early to say if we are out of the third wave, as less recorded infections could be the result of lower testing.

Dr Sylvain Aldhigieri, COVID-19 incident manager, spoke to the dangerous Delta variant now identified as the cause of the recent infections in The Bahamas by labs in South America.

“The most recent samples sequenced at the institute in Panama and Brazil demonstrated 50 percent Delta, 45 percent unfound and 1.3 percent of Gamma,” Dr Aldhigieri said of Delta in The Bahamas.

“Although Delta is becoming predominant in most of the countries of the Caribbean in this context it is important to remember that this process of display and replacement of strains of variants is an expected phenomenon which has been happening early in the pandemic.

“The Delta variant better adapts to the human host as part of their evolution process. In The Bahamas it could be that less people are presenting for testing. Perhaps as vaccination is increasing, people are becoming more relaxed and are less likely to present for testing when they have been exposed.”

Dr Aldhigieri said even though the vaccine roll out is going well, people should continue to use the public health and social measures that are known to work and prevent the spread of COVID-19 including all its variants.

PAHO reports that for the last month, there has been a drop in COVID infections throughout the region, even if cases remain high. Over the last week, nearly 1.2 million COVID-19 cases and 24,000 COVID-related deaths were reported in the region.

Currently, 37 percent of the Caribbean have been fully vaccinated against COVID-19. Jamaica, Nicaragua, and Haiti have yet to reach even 10 percent coverage.