BELIZE CITY, Thurs. Apr. 16, 2020– On Monday, March 23, 2020, the Government of Belize announced that Belize had its first case of coronavirus (COVID-19), and it was a 38-year-old woman who had tested positive for the disease.
The count reached four after it was announced on Friday, April 3, that a male resident of San Ignacio, in the Cayo District, who was employed by the Belize City Council and worked in Belize City, had tested positive for the virus.
By Sunday, April 5, when the government announced that a Belizean student had arrived in the country and had been placed in isolation because he had tested positive for COVID-19, Patient #4 had died in the Karl Heusner Memorial Hospital isolation unit, to which he had been transferred from the Western Regional Hospital on Friday.
Belize’s first death was that of Patient #4, who was later identified as Hubert Pipersburgh, 55. Prime Minister Barrow had this to say: “Mr. Pipersburgh was diagnosed in San Ignacio early on Friday last, and was transferred to the KHMH that same evening. He was then intubated and appeared stable until today, when he deteriorated sharply. He died despite what I am assured were Herculean efforts on the part of the medical staff to save him.”
The count reached ten when Conrad Everett, 65, who became fatality number two, tested positive for the virus before passing away at the KHMH in the early morning hours of Good Friday, April 10.
Dr. Marvin Manzanero, Director of Health Services, said that Everett was initially admitted on Friday, March 27, at the Belize Healthcare Partners Limited, with an initial diagnosis of “community-acquired pneumonia.”
Dr. Manzanero said that Everett was there until March 30, when he self-discharged himself from the institution.
Everett, however, returned to the hospital on Tuesday, March 31, suffering from respiratory distress, which caused him to be intubated that same day at the Belize Healthcare Partners Limited.
When the Ministry of Health traced Everett’s whereabouts, however, the trail led to the Down Town Plaza, opposite Brodies. Apparently, an unknown number of persons held a party at a restaurant there on Saturday, March 14, 2020, and those who attended included some persons who had a recent travel history from the US.
Today, Brodies is closed for COVID-19 fumigation because, apparently, Everett’s wife and a daughter of his work there, and both have also reportedly tested positive.
Another of Everett’s daughters works at Scotia Bank on Albert Street, and that business also was closed for coronavirus cleaning.
The Ministry of Health had asked those persons who were at the party to self-isolate, and said that perhaps, they should be swabbed.
Dr. Manzanero said: “We are tying this particular last cluster to a social activity that involved preliminary data suggesting up to 100 people [may have been involved].”
“I don’t think we have a full guest list …that’s [where] the potential ground zero may have been for that particular cluster,” he said.
In trying to trace the origin of the infection, Dr. Manzanero said, “So when you trace back the previous 14 days, then you go to an activity on the 14th of March that had people who had come in from the US, New York, we are now told, and that’s where the potential outbreak may have happened.”
The three Albert Street businesses may remain closed until next Monday.
Feature photo: (l-r) Hubert Pipersbergh, deceased and Conrad Everett, deceased