9 new COVID-19 cases have been announced by the Permanent Secretary for Health, Doctor James Fong, and more COVID guidelines have been announced to ensure that the Health Ministry focuses on tracing, testing and isolating people.
Doctor Fong says one of the cases announced yesterday worked at Extra Supermarket in Flagstaff Suva. Three of today’s cases are his co-workers.
He says Extra Supermarket has been closed for decontamination purposes while they await test results from the remaining Extra staff and management.
Doctor Fong says Extra Supermarket operates with a well-enforced policy of mask-wearing and mandated that all staff and customers have the careFIJI app installed with Bluetooth turned on, or that contact tracing details were registered.
He says that is allowing them to identify hundreds of contacts very quickly.
Doctor Fong says without the use of the careFIJI app, tracing individual casual contacts in a place like a crowded supermarket is extremely difficult, especially with the contact tracing teams already working overtime every day to keep up with the cases they have.
The careFIJI app will allow contact tracers to see which people have come in close proximity to each other at a specific location.
If you have the app on and functioning, the Health Ministry says the contact tracers can let you know if you have come into contact with an infected person, and he thinks everyone would want to know that.
The Permanent Secretary says while contracting the virus from a casual encounter in which both parties are masked seems rare, they are dealing with a COVID variant that WHO has designated as potentially more contagious, and certainly less predictable.
Doctor Fong says in addition to their traditional contact tracing, those who have been identified as close contacts by the careFIJI app and the written contact tracing registry, including shoppers, are being contacted by the Ministry.
He says while they reach these people, they are asking everyone who has been to Extra Supermarket in Flagstaff or Hanson’s Supermarket in Makoi in the last two weeks to self isolate.
Doctor Fong says they will announce in due course once everyone on the list has been contacted.
He says those found to not have had contact with these new cases will be allowed to end their period of self-isolation.
The Permanent Secretary says he wants to remind anyone who runs out to a grocery store for supplies: Make sure your mask is on, your careFIJI app is installed, and your Bluetooth is switched on while you shop.
He notes that some supermarkets have online shopping and home delivery services as well.
He urges the public to use them, and also urges more supermarkets and businesses to make online shopping and delivery available.
Another two individuals presented to the Nausori Health Centre with COVID symptoms.
Doctor Fong says they are family members from Lakena in Nausori. Two of their household contacts have also tested positive for COVID-19.
He says at this early stage of the investigation, these cases are not linked to other clusters.
One of these individuals worked at Nausori market as a vendor. That space is being decontaminated.
Another case is an individual from Vunimono in Nausori who also tested positive after presenting to the health centre. This case is also not linked to other cases.
He says so far, none of these six cases in Nausori are currently linked to existing cases.
While they are still early into the investigation, they will be treating these cases as instances of community transmission until they are proven to be otherwise.
The final confirmed case is a border quarantine staff who tested positive for COVID-19 in the course of routine testing. This person’s last negative test result was from 1st May 2021.
Doctor Fong says their investigations have not pinpointed a source of transmission for this case. Until they know more, they are not allowing any discharges from the quarantine facility in question.
He says this series of new clusters requires large-scale contact tracing to the magnitude of several hundred primary and secondary contacts.
Doctor Fong says the cluster emanating from Extra Supermarket is of particular concern.
However, he says this cluster is unlike past clusters, such as the garment factory case, for one simple reason: careFIJI. He says the app’s use has given them a huge advantage in identifying the closest contacts stemming from the Extra Supermarket cases.
He says they are already locating them and testing them in droves.
Doctor Fong says they expect many more of these individuals to register positive test results.
