Epidemiologist Dr Avery Hinds has revealed that there has been an increasing number of COVID-19 cases in people over 60 years over the past month.
Speaking at today’s Ministry of Health media briefing, Dr Hinds denied this increase could be linked to the recent vaccine fiasco, which saw elderly people lined up in high numbers outside health centres to receive the jab.
Dr Hinds said the ministry monitored for spikes two weeks after the incidents occurred “and actually did not see one.”
He said “The possibility is that because it was in limited numbers of places and the duration was actually cut short by dispersing the crowds etcetera, the event itself may not have had the time to generate the spike that we may have been looking for or expecting if that had gone on for longer or had involved more people.”
He said a large number of the cases seen in this elderly category of people was because of clusters occurring within elder care facilities. This, he said, is why the ministry has been trying to encourage people within these facilities to get vaccinated.
Dr Hinds added that they did see quite a few cases of in-house spread.
He note “Again we want to emphasise the importance of the isolation behaviours and precautions even within the household when you are a COVID positive patient that doesn’t require hospitalisation.”
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