–officials urge health ministry to act

Four deaths and several sick people have led to officials in Region One (Barima/Waini) calling for urgent assistance from the Ministry of Health and a team is to visit the area shortly.

Regional officials want an urgent investigation into what could have caused four people to die after bouts of diarrhoea and vomiting; several other residents of the region have been hospitalised with the same gastro-like illness.

“To my mind this is very serious and the ministry need to do something,” Toshao of Moruca, Joseph Marco De Souza said yesterday. A mother and son died just over a week apart in that village; both of them had been suffering from the same symptoms.

Stabroek News has confirmed that 32-year-old Calvin Charlie died last week Monday afternoon shortly after he was transferred to the Suddie Hospital while his mother, 63-year-old Helena Charlie, died on Tuesday this week at the Moruca Hospital almost a week after she was admitted to the hospital.

De Souza said several other persons have fallen ill and are suffering from diarrhoea and vomiting and some of them have been hospitalised. He said he has since contacted the Health Ministry. He said last weekend the hospital was full – there were two persons to a bed – and all the patients had the same symptoms.

Regional Chairman Fermin Singh yesterday confirmed to Stabroek News that he had received reports of four deaths in the region – two in Moruca and two in Port Kaituma – all under the same circumstances. However, he said as far as he knows there is no outbreak of anything and he has instructed that samples be taken and sent to Georgetown to be tested.

Stabroek News understands that residents of Barima and Waini, two other areas in the region, are also suffering from similar complaints and while there are reports of deaths none have been confirmed.

This newspaper was unable to speak with Regional Health Officer Loraine Gilkes, as when her office was contacted it was revealed that she was in Georgetown.

When contacted Chief Medical Officer Dr Shamdeo Persaud told Stabroek News he had received reports of the illness but had only been told of two deaths; one in Port Kaituma and one in Moruca. He said a team from the ministry was expected to visit the affected areas. According to Dr Persaud when he looks at the ministry’s records, usually, around this time, when it is raining, a number of persons tend to suffer from diarrhoea and vomiting.

“So the increases in reports are expected because sometimes the water is contaminated with [sewage from] the overflowing of toilets…” Persaud said. However, he acknowledged that the deaths are unusual.

He pointed out that sometimes persons are living in distant areas and would prefer not to go the hospital because of the difficulties they would experience during such a journey.

‘Healthy young man’

Speaking to Stabroek News yesterday Monica Garett, cousin and niece of Calvin and Helena respectively, said Calvin fell ill and was admitted to the Moruca Hospital on June 19. According to her, he was a “healthy young man” and as such it was a surprise when he took ill with diarrhoea and vomiting.

Garett, who lives in the city, but was in the village to spend Father’s Day with her father, said her cousin was not seen by the medex for over a day and a half after he was admitted because she was also suffering from the same illness and was too ill to attend to any patient. She said that by the time the medex arrived at the hospital, which was last week Sunday, her cousin’s hands and feet were black and blue and he was very weak.

“Anyway she tried with him but he was not getting better and it was until last week Monday afternoon she decided to transfer him to Suddie and by then it may have been too late,” Garett said.

The man’s brother Kenrick Charlie, speaking to this newspaper by telephone yesterday, even as he prepared for his mother’s funeral, related that the boat journey to Charity was a very difficult one as the ocean was rough.

“He just keep screaming and screaming in pain and then he couldn’t scream anymore,” the brother said. He said when they arrived at Charity he was taken to the hospital there and given oxygen.

“He [was] barely breathing. But when they give he oxygen he started to breathe properly and then they put him in the ambulance to take him to Suddie but then there was no oxygen in the tank in the ambulance,” Kenrick said. He said by the time they arrived at the Suddie Hospital he just knew his brother would not have made it and they were told as much by the doctor on duty.

“But they try and after about 15 minutes the doctor say he gone…,” Kenrick said.

Calvin Charlie was a father of five children between the ages of nine years old and one year old and his reputed wife Nicola Shahabudeen is expecting their sixth child. He was laid to rest last week Wednesday.

The afternoon of the funeral, Kenrick said, his mother was admitted to the hospital and even though over the weekend she eased up vomiting she succumbed early Tuesday evening.

“We thought she like coming around when she stop vomiting but then she still die,” Kenrick told Stabroek News.

Fifteen cases

Meanwhile, Vice-Chair-man of the Nighbourhood Democratic Council (NDC) of Port Kaituma Richard Allen said 15 people were admitted to the hospital in that area all suffering from dehydration due to the vomiting and diarrhoea but by last weekend all were discharged. He said as far as he knows one man died at home after several days of attempting to treat himself; while another man died in Georgetown.

He confirmed that many persons were suffering from the same illness. He said while the medex feels that it has to do with the sanitary conditions of the environs where the persons live, no tests have been done to confirm this.

Allen said also that people are waiting until they almost can’t walk before going to the hospital and he pointed out that it is a dangerous practice. He called for the Health Ministry do the necessary tests in order to ascertain what is causing the illness.

While the regional chairman admitted that there is need to have tests done, he insists that there is no outbreak of any illness and stressed that people should not panic.

“People are saying it is all kinds of things and some are panicking but no one knows what is causing the illness and then people are waiting too late to go to the hospital. They want to stay home and treat themselves,” Singh said.

Moruca resident Robin De Souza, who said he was ill for almost five days with the same complaint, said that there is need for the ministry to do something before it is too late.

“I feel that older people wouldn’t be able to survive this because your body really getting weak,” he said.