Health Minister Dr Frank Anthony announced that the Government is currently working with different companies to procure both the Pfizer and Merck COVID treatment pills.
During Monday’s COVID-19 update, the Minister stated that while the Government cannot manufacture these pills, they are currently working with private companies to acquire same.
“What we are working on currently is to make sure that we can secure both the Merck drug and the Pfizer drug and so we have been trying to work with different companies to see if we can get that into Guyana.”
As Guyana is yet to acquire this treatment regimen, the Minister continues to encourage that persons get vaccinated.
“The appeal would be to get people to be vaccinated and hopefully we can get more people coming out to get these vaccines.”
Meanwhile, the Minister revealed that the Health Ministry is currently monitoring 4358 active COVID-19 cases, with another 167 new cases being detected within the last 24 hours.
A breakdown of the new cases showed 28 in Region One (Barima-Waini); 13 in Region Two (Pomeroon-Supenaam); 19 in Region Three (Essequibo Islands-West Demerara); 62 in Region Four (Demerara-Mahaica); two in Region Five (Mahaica-Berbice); five in Region Six (East Berbice-Corentyne); three in Region Seven (Cuyuni-Mazaruni); one in Region Eight (Potaro-Siparuni); 14 in Region Nine (Upper Takutu-Upper Essequibo) and 20 in Region 10 (Upper Demerara-Berbice).
There are currently 91 persons in hospitals across the country with 68 persons at the Ocean View Facility. Of those, 17 persons are in the ICU.
New deaths
The Health Ministry reported on Wednesday that three new COVID-19 deaths were recorded. These are an 86-year-old woman from Region 10 who died on Wednesday; a 72-year-old man from Region Two who died on February 7 and an 80-year-old from Region Three died on February 8.
These three new deaths now take the total COVID-19 death toll in Guyana to 1188.
So far 427,336 or 83.3 per cent of adults have received a first dose of the COVID vaccines while 319,596 or 62.3 per cent have received a second dose of the COVID vaccines.
For the 12 to 17 age cohort, 32,978 or 45.2 per cent have received a first dose of the Pfizer vaccines while 23,528 or 32.3 per cent have received both doses.
In terms of booster doses, 43,715 persons have received their doses.
