Amid global concerns regarding the human metapneumovirus (HMPV) outbreak in China – sparking fears of another pandemic – Guyana’s Health Minister Dr Frank Anthony has assured that local health authorities are building its capacity to deal with a wide variety of viruses.
In fact, he noted that the country has secured US$15 million in financing which should become available later this year to further strengthen capacity to deal with emerging threats to public health.
Asked directly about HMPV, Dr Anthony noted that “we have been checking. We haven’t had any cases here and, in the region, CARPHA has the capability of being able to diagnose.”
However, the Health Minister explained that this is not a new virus. “This is something that has been around for many years, looking at the disease profile, it is not one where you have high fatality rates,” he said.
In fact, he explained that in Guyana, “we have had cases, let’s say like a cousin of this particular disease…and we’ve been able to manage them quite successfully, so we don’t anticipate a challenge.”
“But since we’ve seen whatever is going on globally, we have made sure that we would be able to collect samples and being able to send those samples for further diagnoses,” the minister added.
The Health Minister went on to explained that with infectious diseases, “one of the things you will see happening is you’ll have many more of these things coming to the fore.”
In this regard, he said “what is important is that you have a system where you are prepared to manage…in Guyana we have done quite a lot of work to manage viral diseases.”
He referenced the US$15 million in financing the country secured from the Global Pandemic Fund, which was established after COVID-19 to look at how countries can better prepare for future pandemics.
This fund, which is expected to be released in March, will help in strengthening local surveillance and laboratory systems as well as to recruit more specialists within the Ministry of Health.
The project would cover a period of three years, he noted.
In this regard, Dr Anthony posited that “we’re not preparing for a single disease. This would help us to enhance the system so that if there is anything in the animal population that jumps into the human population, we’d be able to detect it and have a stronger approach to viruses in the human population.”
