And while Lynroy's family mourns his death, a dozen more families are in mourning after their loved ones passed away from COVID related complications just this week.
Actually, it's 13 COVID deaths reported between Sunday and last night - a dire situation, which prompted internist, Dr Fernando Cuellar to sound the alarm this morning on Krem's Wake Up Belize morning show.
He no doubt sent chills down many spines when he said, quote, "People will soon start dying in waiting areas, parking lots, on the streets." End quote. This eyeopener followed an intense virtual meeting he had with other members of the Belize Medical and Dental Association last night. He told us today that he felt he needed to make the information public so that Belizeans can fully understand the magnitude of the pandemic: people are dying, resources are scarce, the health system is overwhelmed, and if you or your loved one needed urgent care, chances are, you would have a hard time even getting into the hospital.
Dr. Fernando Cuellar - Internist "Our healthcare system both public and private has gone beyond its limits. Unfortunately we have deficiencies in all the regional hospitals and the major hospitals and private hospitals when it comes to taking care of COVID patients and we also should remember it's not all about COVID patients, we have other patients with other conditions that needs to be taken care of. The human resource part is the part that bothers me most, our nurses our doctors working and everybody is overwhelmed, everybody have gone past their limits but again I want to stress that it's message was towards the Belizean populous, it's not getting tangled with no politician or no government or no party or that kind of thing, it was for the Belizean people to know where we stand, the bare truth, the raw truth because only so, we can curve this pandemic."
Reporter "How dire does the situation from your point of view being inside the hospital, how dire is it?"
Dr. Fernando Cuellar "Dire, dire, dire, dire, how much more times can I say dire. We're up s-creek, we stand bad, we're messed up, I don't know what in Spanish, estamos jodidos. That is what I want to tell the people, countless cases where people go to the hospital can't get admitted, they are waiting in their cars, the parking lot, they have to go home back. We don't see them yet being thrown across the street but if we continue like this, within a week or two you might indeed see people dying in their cars waiting and the waiting areas and so forth. We are there, so Belizean people please, this is for you, let's do things differently."
Prevention is better than cure, and while following the mask wearing and social distancing protocols are ideal, Dr Cuellar had some suggestions of his own for the Ministry of Health and Wellness as well as other medical professionals. One of those suggestions was that free, random testing should be available in every district.
Dr. Fernando Cuellar "We need more testing for sure throughout the country, we need more contact tracers, we need to hire younger people, we don't need to be doctor or nurses to do swabbing and testing, a 6th former, 4th former can do that, they can do the contact traces and I always say no insult me by tell we you no have the money, unno find the money. You find the money, we fight the virus, we isolate the virus and our economy will also prosper. I am not one of those for full lockdowns for sure, we have to get our livelihood back and we have to do these targeted strategic measures and I think that the ministry has announced that they are going to do, then I'm glad but I'm definitely not one for the full lockdown. I want to also ask my colleagues by professional colleagues to speak up some more, technocrats on a whole speak up and not be bullied by the politicians and say the truth, it's for the good of the country."
Dr Cuellar explained that while these are only suggestions from himself, the BMDA would be more than happy to make further recommendations to the Ministry.
