BELIZE CITY, Mon. Oct. 19, 2020– Late this evening, the office of the Director of Health Services (DHS) released its latest findings with regards to the COVID-19 pandemic.
It said that a total of 154 samples were processed, with 20 new cases identified, giving a positive rate of 12.99%.
The cases are distributed as follows: Orange Walk – 12 (6 town, 3 Chan Pine Ridge, 1 San Estevan, 1 San Pablo, 1 Trial Farm); and Belize – 8 (7 city, 1 Hattieville).
We had 22 recoveries today, so that 38.7% of our cases remain active.
We have one death to report, said the infographic, and this is in a male in his 30’s from Trial Farm who was found gasping for breath at home and died on arrival at the Northern Regional Hospital. This person had been swabbed previously in July. The diagnosis was made post-mortem.
The report confirmed a total of 2,833 cases so far.
The number of cases of COVID-19, however, continues to balloon in the north, as we have seen over this weekend. Orange Walk has passed the 1,000-case mark, and now accounts for 36% of cases countrywide.
The closure of an entire healthcare facility in Belize City and one of the units in another Belize City medical center were also officially announced over the weekend. The Belize Endoscopy and Gastroenterology Center reported that 7 of its workers were COVID-19 positive, triggering its shutdown.
Also, the Ministry of Health is monitoring an outbreak which originated at the dialysis ward at the Belize Medical Associates.
As of October 18, a total of 2,813 cases of COVID-19 have been confirmed; 1,099 of those cases remain active, while 1,670 infected persons have recovered.
Forty-four COVID-19-related deaths have now been recorded in Belize, the four most recent of which were recorded over a three-day timespan. On October 15, the death of a man in his 60’s was announced. He is reported to have been referred to the Karl Heusner Memorial Hospital (KHMH) from the northern region and was admitted to the hospital’s ICU, but died shortly after.
Two deaths, both males, were also recorded on October 16. One of these men had also been referred to the KHMH’s ICU from the north, but passed away, and the second man, from the Belize District, died after suffering from a cardio-embolic event.
The most recent death is that of a female from the Orange Walk District, a resident of August Pine Ridge reported to be in her 50’s. She had battled with COVID-19 for two weeks inside the KHMH ICU, but died on October 17. Our fatality rate currently stands at 1.6%.
On the testing and vaccine front, Dr. Marvin Manzanero, Director of Health Services (DHS), said that 20,000 PCR tests and 23,000 SD Biosensor Rapid tests are currently in-country. To date, Belize has already paid $382,080 USD to the COVAX facility to secure vaccines for 30% of our population — 120,000 doses, to be exact. The country will have to find an additional $2.1 million USD by the time the vaccines are available.
Recently, the country has been seeing increased positivity rates; 25-27% percent of all samples tested are found to be COVID-19 cases. Dr. Manzanero said that this is caused by a bigger cluster that is currently being followed by the Ministry of Health.
Data on October 15 showed 63 new cases from 264 samples processed. Sixteen cases are reported to have recovered on that day.
Of those cases discovered on October 15, 25 cases, distributed across a number of villages in the Orange Walk District, were found. Twenty-four were found in Corozal, 10 in Belize, 2 in Toledo, and 1 in Stann Creek and Cayo, respectively.
Of the 18 samples processed on October 16, 46 came back as positive. Twenty-five of these were again found in the Orange Walk District, 13 in Belize, 7 in Cayo, and 1 in Corozal. Sixteen recoveries were also recorded on that day.
 On October 17, Orange Walk passed the 1,000th case mark, with only 1 case being identified in San Pablo. Forty-seven cases were found from a batch of 326 samples processed; 15 of those 47 cases turned out to be front-line workers.
Twenty-two cases were recorded as recovered, but 12 new cases were found in Corozal, 26 in Belize, 4 in Cayo, 3 in Toledo, and as mentioned, 1 in Orange Walk.
Five healthcare staff from the KHMH were also infected; these persons were reportedly exposed at a private facility.
Data released on October 18 showed 38 new cases identified from a batch of 173 samples. As it stands, 39.1% of our cases remain active after the 22 recoveries recorded on that day.
A total of 22 new cases were found in Corozal — 12 in Orange Walk, 2 in Belize, and 1 in Cayo and Stann Creek respectively.