Ministry of Health advises caution for Carnival

The Ministry of Health, Wellness and the Environment has issued a notice to the public to do whatever is necessary during this carnival season to protect themselves from contracting infectious diseases including Dengue, influenza, the COVID-19 virus and Leptospirosis.

For this year, St Vincent and the Grenadines (SVG) has recorded seventy-four confirmed cases of influenza, 13 confirmed cases of Dengue fever, 102 cases of COVID-19 virus and 13 confirmed cases of Leptospirosis, the ministry said in its statement. Influenza (flu), and COVID-19 are highly contagious viral infections of the respiratory tract that can cause severe illness with life-threatening complications. Typically affecting people of all ages, these diseases can spread when an infected person coughs and or sneezes. Some symptoms are high fever (38°C or more), dry cough, sore throat, body aches and fatigue.

Other symptoms include chills, aches behind the eyes, loss of appetite, vomiting and diarrhoea.

Dengue is mosquito borne illness that is caused by the bite of an infected mosquito.

Persons are encouraged to seek care early from their health care provider if they are experiencing fever accompanied with nausea, vomiting, rash or aches and pains (eye pain, typically behind the eyes, muscle, joint, or bone pain).

Leptospirosis is a bacterial disease, spread through contaminated fluids from rodents such as rats and mongooses, that affects humans and animals. Symptoms associated with Leptospirosis include, high fever, headache, chills, muscle aches, vomiting, jaundice (yellow skin and eyes), red eyes, abdominal pain, diarrhoea and rash. Some infected persons, however, may have no symptoms at all.

The ministry wishes to advise anyone experiencing any of these signs and symptoms to seek medical attention from your district health care team or their private healthcare provider.

Persons are encouraged to lead healthy lives and to take all of the proven personal and community precautionary measures such as hand washing, wearing a face mask, maintaining physical distancing, keeping your surroundings clean and reducing mosquito breeding sites, to reduce the spreading or contracting any of these and other diseases.