New measures to help limit spread of virus
A CAUTIONARY and conservative approach has been taken when it comes to introducing new measures to help limit the spread of coronavirus in Guernsey and avoid overwhelming the island’s infrastructure.
Public Health yesterday announced new advice against non-essential travel to and from the Bailiwick and a more cautious approach for those with flu-like or respiratory symptoms to self-isolate, irrespective of whether they have travelled recently.
‘We’ve always said that we need a calm, proportionate approach, but our approach also needed to take into account the resilience of our local infrastructure,’ director of Public Health Dr Nicola Brink said.
‘We have had a single case on the island and we are still looking to contain any spread [by] rapid identification of the case, quarantining that person, identifying their contacts, putting in place appropriate infection control precautions and flattening the curve so we see fewer cases than we would see without those containment measures.’
Contact tracing for the confirmed case is ongoing. All close contacts with the patient have been notified and they are on ‘active surveillance’ whereby they have to report any clinical symptoms consistent with the virus.
Any respiratory symptoms must be reported, however minor.
The contacts also have a ‘safe and well’ check from Public Health where their symptoms are assessed and they are looked after in a holistic approach to ensure overall wellbeing. The countries which islanders return from and require testing are frequently being reviewed.
Changing precautionary measures relatively early provides a better opportunity to control the community’s spread of the virus.
‘We need to ensure that our hospital structure does not become overwhelmed and we are able to provide islanders with the clinical care they need. But with that, we need islanders to do their bit and try and prevent spread of the virus around the community.’
It has been planned from the beginning of the virus outbreak that Guernsey will probably have to cope on its own, hence the conservative approach.
‘If [our infrastructure and resources] are overwhelmed, it is very likely that the UK will be overwhelmed so when we have had a more conservative practice on country selection and bringing in measures earlier than other jurisdictions, that has been done in reflection of the need to try and protect our infrastructure and prevent as many transmissions as we can,’ Dr Brink said.
From the very beginning of the outbreak, Guernsey health officials have had a more conservative approach in order to protect the island’s community, resilience and infrastructure.
For example, the patient with the confirmed case returned from Tenerife which Public Health Guernsey categorised as a Group B country.
The UK had not.
Health & Social Care president Deputy Heidi Soulsby said items on the committee’s agenda that overlap with Public Health, such as the substance misuse strategy and gambling, have taken a back seat while dealing with the ‘far more important’ Covid-19 situation. Proportionate planning will help the island to avoid situations which are being seen in Italy where hospitals are becoming overwhelmed.
‘We could not predict how the island was or is going to be affected, but it wasn’t a case of if Covid-19 was going to come to our island, it was a case of when.
‘We expected it to come and now we move into the next phase,’ Dr Brink said.
