The public alone is not to be blamed

May 13, 2020 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

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Almost every day, on the daily COVID-19 update, the blame for the rising number of confirmed cases of the virus is laid solely at the feet of irresponsible members of the public. These persons are being accused of refusing to abide by the published regulations aimed at suppressing the spread of the virus.
But the public alone should not have to shoulder all the blame. The government must also assume some responsibility for the increasing number of cases.
It was the government which was at least one week late in implementing a partial lockdown. It is the government which has imposed social restrictions without any effective implementation measures.
Right now the police are circumspect about arresting persons. And despite the local epidemic being the most serious health crisis the country has ever faced, the government has not seen it fit to ask the Guyana Defence Force to support the civil authorizes to enforce the restrictions.
The government has its reasons for its reluctance to order a total lockdown or to be stricter in enforcing the present restrictions. People are suffering out there. Some people have to work in order to eat. They live day-to-day. Some people are finding it hard to put food on the table.
The social restrictions have been in place for five weeks. These restrictions have imposed severe hardships on large sections of the population. Thousands of persons are not working, and those who are, are earning far less than usual. A financial crisis is brewing. Businesses are facing bankruptcy. International help cannot be accessed because the international community is reluctant to put money in a de facto government’s hands.
By now Guyana should have been transitioning out of the social restrictions. Instead, the situation is getting worse with this past week seeing a surge in local cases.
The Public Health Ministry has been providing a useless scorecard each day to the public. The information provided is woefully inadequate. There is no regional breakdown of the total number of confirmed cases. Only some hotspots have been identified but no numbers given about how many from each of these areas were tested positive.
Every day, the total number of tests done is announced. But the public is not told how many persons were tested overall, since it is possible for a person to be tested twice. This is the sort of data that would be more helpful
There is no information as to the reproduction number of the virus. There is no assessment done as to how many of the local cases have been traced to imported cases. The public is being asked to report any contact they may have had with an infected person but if you do not know who is infected, how can you know that you have had contact with them.
We have had reports of an outbreak at the Palms. The authorities have not said whether they have tested everyone there. This would be necessary given the spread of the virus in care homes in other countries of the world.
We are told that the Cuyuni- Mazaruni has its first case. But that is a big region and the number at risk would depend on which community that first case originated.
Contact-tracing in the present scenario is important. The ministry should have long now been able to tell the public just how many of the local cases have been linked to how many of the imported cases. This would provide a measure of the effectiveness of the contact-tracing.
More information would allow for more informed decisions. For example, if Georgetown is the epicenter and if there are no or only a small number of cases in some regions, would it not be best to adopt region-specific strategies rather than having one strategy for the entire country?
The Ministry keeps imploring about the need to flatten the curve of total confirmed cases. How can you flatten the curve of total cases? The curve will rise with each new case. It cannot be flattened.
It has to be bent. Right now the curve has too steep a gradient and it is reducing this gradient which should be the objective. This means efforts should be made to bend the curve more to the right rather than having it move along either the same slope or rise more to the left. This will mean that the second derivative – the growth of the cases is slowing.
What has to be flattened is the number of new cases. When plotted it would be desirable for the average number of weekly cases to flatten. Experience has shown, however, in the United States that while that country has passed through its peak of new deaths, the curve is plateauing rather than bending downwards. What this means is that social restrictions should not be relaxed very quickly.
The reality, which must be faced, is that the Ministry of Public Health needs to be more forthcoming with the public. Its daily reports have become a scorecard rather than an updated assessment of the spread of the virus. The Ministry needs help to be able to develop some statistical benchmarks which would influence their decision on easing social restrictions.
As for the National COVID-19 Task Force and its newly-installed Secretariat, somebody should let the public know just what it is doing. Apart from advising GECOM on social distancing.

(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of this newspaper.)

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