Testing is still too low and too slow

Oct 03, 2020 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

Kaieteur News – The local airports will reopen within the next nine days. The reopening increases the risk of imported coronavirus infections.
In order to reduce this risk, the government has indicated that persons have to be tested at their point of origin, that is, the country from whence they came. However, since it is possible that they got infected during the period between testing and when they actually arrive in Guyana, if the test was done more than 72 hours prior to arrival, then any such person will have to be tested on arrival.
It means that provision has to be made for taking samples at the airports. This apparently is being arranged but at the rate at which the Ministry of Health gets emergency things done, it is not clear whether proper arrangements are going to be in place by October 12, 2020.
There is also another major problem. Assuming four or five flights each day at each of the two main international airports, it could mean that as many as 500 tests may have to be done at the airport. Does the country have the capability to read these tests results within a day or for that matter within two days?
The news is now reporting that Donald Trump is being taken to Walter Reed Medical Facility. Just hours before his coronavirus positive test was announced, he appeared normal and was addressing a gathering. Within hours, all the major news outfits were reporting that he is being taken to hospital as a precautionary measure. It shows how quickly a person’s condition can deteriorate.
If the Government of Guyana does not have the capability to return test results within a few hours, they may be contributing to increased deaths. The President did announce big plans to increase testing and reduce the testing time to a few hours. This has not happened as yet.
While the country is now testing an average of eight times more persons than prior to August 2020, the average daily tests is nowhere near 300 tests per day. So how is the government going to cope with the increases need for testing when the airports reopen to international commercial flights?
Two weeks ago, we were supposed to be importing automatic testing machines to decrease the turnover time between tests and results. A special plane should have been chartered to bring in these machines. We are sill to learn about the gene testing machines and the cartridge, which was supposed to be procured to make these machines operable.
The government has become less specific in relation to increasing its testing capacity. It is now saying just how may samples it is capable of taking each day and how many of these it can return results in the same day. Given the way this virus operates, a 48 or even a 24-hour wait for results is extremely dangerous. People need to know their status early so that they can take precautions.
The time has come for the government to appoint someone to become the interface with the public regarding the coronavirus. While COVID-19 is understandably the Minister’s number one priority, he needs to have a go-getter to get things done faster regarding testing, treatment and the procurement of equipment, including ventilators. This person must be high-level. This job requires a full time job and someone who is prepared to work 16 hours per day to get things in place.
You cannot expect the Minister of Health to have to brief the media every day plus address all the other problems within the country’s health system. The Minister has some help in the form of PPP/C acolytes. But he should keep very far from some of these political appointees and in fact should try his best to push them out of the system because some of them are only there to look after their own material interests.
Yesterday, there were just more than 200 tests done. This shows that enough testing is not being done throughout the country but especially in Region Four.
Testing has to be increased corresponding with an increase in the capacity to return results the same day. The situation in the country is already frightening. Every day we get the results from the COVID dashboard and then later we hear about the deaths.

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