Acting Director of Primary Healthcare, Dr. Gilda Nesty-Tonge has highlighted the importance of contact tracing in preventing the spread of the dreaded Covid-19 pandemic and is discouraging the withholding information which “stalls and weakens the contact tracing process.”
“Contact tracing can protect you, your family and by extension your community,” she stated. “It is the process of identifying, assessing and managing people who have been exposed to a disease, in this case, Coronavirus.”
She said the goals of contact tracing include early detection, early isolation of contacts and reduction in community and healthcare associated spread.
“A contact can be classified as a high risk contact or primary contact, that is a close contact or a low risk or casual contact,” Dr. Nesty-Tonge explained. “These are oftentimes referred to as our secondary or tertiary contacts.”
She further explained that a high risk or primary contact is anyone who has been within 6 feet of an infected person for at least 15 minutes.
“Other high risk contacts include household contacts of an infected case, individuals with greater than 15 minutes face-to-face exposure, healthcare workers exposed to a positive case without the appropriate use of a PPE, passengers on an aircraft within two seats in any direction, individuals sharing a close space with a case for greater than two hours, but within two meters of one another and any individual who comes into direct contact with body fluids and lab specimens of a diseased case,” Dr. Nesty-Tonge explained.
A casual contact is said to be a low risk contact and this category includes health workers who have taken appropriate PPE precautions, individuals sharing a closed space for less than two hours, but not within two meters of one another and passengers on an aircraft beyond 2 feet in any direction.
Dr. Nesty-Tonge noted that once there is adequate virus in the system of an infected person they can now spread the disease.
“The disease spread can occur even before the infected person begins to show signs and symptoms,” she said. “This is another one of the reasons why proper contact tracing is crucial.”
Your best defense is a strong immune system, not vaccines or quarantines. You don’t see the so call “experts” stressing things that will boost your immune system (vitamins, zinc, fresh air, rest, meditation, etc) do you? Only monetary profits are at work as well as control antics.
Contact tracing is only effective in the first 48 hrs. following contact. This is not a highly contagious disease and the health professionals are receiving erroneous information.
Give us numbers that’s not related to the police.
I don’t trust the police.
The government is using covid-19 to instll fear and poverty and unfortunately our doctors and medical personnels are allowing themselves to be used in that political game.
I firmly support contract tracing but the question to be asked is, has the government done enough to do contract tracing? It short that’s a BIG NO! Here is why: 1 Guadeloupe and Martinique are on partial lockdown and as a result no boats or planes traveling
2. The majority of Dominicans in those islands are illegal and aren’t working or getting anything from the government. So it’s a life and death situation and coming home is their only choice
3. Our protocol for citizens is discouraging. Take Barbados for example where citizens or non citizens have the option of going to a government quarantine for FREE and those who wish to go to a hotel have to pay. In Dominica Skerrit is using his shoe to squeeze us, kick us out and stand on us. We have to pay for very substandard quarantine at Skerrit’s own place.