On October 9th we told you that the Belize Central prison had gone on a 21-day-lockdown. It was an effort to combat the Covid-19 virus which had spread roots within the prison walls. And this morning, sixty days later, Prison CEO Virgilio Murillo was able to announce that the last of Kolbe Foundation's prison inmates have been released from quarantine, making the prison is COVID free.
Our News team headed up to Hattieville this morning to find out just how they managed to clear their cases and what measures will be put in place to avoid any sort of round two.
Virgilio Murillo, C.E.O, Kolbe Foundation
"When we did the 21-day lockdown we had just discovered 90 cases out of 186 tests that were conducted and that was a little bit over 50% positivity rate which was unacceptable to the prison. So, we had to make that decision as unpopular as it may have seen, but we did it and we have absolutely no regrets in having done so. I was informed by our medical doctor yesterday that we were down to zero cases. The last 15 cases that we had they were release yesterday, so that puts the prison at Covid free status as of this point."
Reporter
"You've gotten here, but how you stay here, because the threat of Covid in an environment as fluid as this is ever present. What are the measures that you are going to take moving forward?"
Virgilio Murillo, C.E.O, Kolbe Foundation
"Well we will carry on what we have always been doing. Remember at one point we were in preventive mode where we were trying to prevent it from entering the prison, but like I keep saying for anybody to think that it would remain out of prison with the explosion taking place on the outside its wishful thinking. There are measures that prisons need to put in place just like society such as the hand hygiene, the wearing of face masks, temperature checks and all of these things and we will carry on with those and we won't spare anybody from entering the prison without having gone through the protocols and procedures. The problem would really come from the staff who needs to report here to work here, especially if they are asymptomatic and the temperature check doesn't reveal anything. So they would be the danger and quite frankly we have at least 45 staff from the Orange Walk District and you know that the Orange Walk District as far as I am aware has always been the epicenter of this virus and even with 45 staff we are not doing too bad after all. The 21 days in itself holistically definitely paid off."
Reporter
"What is it doing to the overall moral of the inmates though to not be able to see their families?"
Virgilio Murillo, C.E.O, Kolbe Foundation
"They are still maintaining that contact through telephone until we can probably come up with some sort of virtual way of doing business and we are currently working on something like that for them. So I believe detention is not so high and I believe once we have gotten the devices to afford them some virtual meetings so they can see their love ones, I think that should be even better for them."
Murillo also told us that many of the prison's cases were fortunately asymptomatic and that none of the inmates required hospitalization. The prison will now return to preventive mode with the hope that they have put mitigative mode behind them.
