The indigenous community of St Ignatius has been seeing a spike in COVID-19 cases and even two deaths within the last month, but its co-dependency and proximity to Lethem has made in impossible to implement stringent measures.
On Monday, the village council of St Ignatius located in the Central Rupununi, Region Nine, instituted several measures including a six pm to six am curfew on residents in an effort to curb the spread of the virus in the community.
According to Toshao Winston Lorentino, while the number of COVID-19 cases in the community had not been more than five for weeks, the death of two elderly persons prompted doctors to conduct swabbing in the community. He disclosed that the two persons died suddenly at their homes and were tested after their deaths. Their results returned positive.
“Nobody knew they had COVID. They probably thought they had some other sickness but they died at their homes,” he said.
Since then the cases have increased rapidly and the community now has more than 40 active cases. With the increasing number of cases on a daily basis and the constant breaches of the COVID-19 measures, Lorentino said the village council considered a lockdown but after much consideration it was decided against. He disclosed that persons living in St Ignatius work in Lethem and vice versa.
Before implementing the measures discussions were held with the relevant persons and everyone felt it was necessary considering the daily rise of infections.
“We want the cases to drop. It’s been a month and it continues to rise. Everything was normal before but people are not adhering to protocols especially the young people,” Lorentino complained. He noted that many persons are refusing to get vaccinated against the virus because of the conspiracy theories that are circulating.
“I have tried to lead by example and got vaccinated. It’s the young people that don’t want to take it but they are also not adhering to the measures so the cases are spreading,” he said before adding that majority of the persons who are infected with the disease are asymptomatic so the virus is transmitting very easily.
Region Nine has almost 400 confirmed cases of COVID-19 with the majority being recorded in St Ignatius and Sand Creek in the South Rupununi.
Lorentino says he hopes that residents will adhere to the measures that the village council has instituted saying that it is only being done to protect them.
