And tonight with vaccination numbers on the rise, the hope is that we can have fewer COVID hospitalizations and far fewer deaths.
It would mean a respite, a much-needed one, for the medical staff at the KHMH who for months have been battling to save the lives of COVID patients.
It's a battle that's often won but sometimes lost, and to devastating effect. That's because a COVID death is unlike any other. Cherisse Halsall reports in part 3 of her series inside the ICU.
In the last few days we've shown you the entrance and experience of The KHMHs COVID ward.
And as Unit Manager Casilda Bowman told us, when you come here it's truly the worst day of your life. The harder reality, however, is that it could also mean the end of it. And tonight as we come to the end of our series on the COVID Ward we'll tell you about the ward's worst case scenario, a COVID death.
Lisa Tillett Moir - Senior Health Inspector, Central Health Region
"Death is the ultimate price you pay for COVID and it's a hurt and a pain that is unexplained because firstly us as Belizeans we get our satisfaction from being able to touch say goodby to our love ones, look at them in the coffin make sure their dressed, their beautiful and everything but when your dealing with COVID all you see is a bag, a plastic bag and somebody is in there and for some of us you know we can't put a face to the bag but for others they know exactly who is in there, what was their last breath, what was their last suffering but how do they look after they die, they can only imagine that."
That's because opening a body bag creates the risk of infection and could be a hazard to both the family members who risk it and the undertakers who allow it.
But while Lisa supervises the end of that process, it starts in the COVID Unit
Casilda Bowman - Unit Manager, Covid Patient Under Investigation Unit
"We clean down the body, we wash it down with our cleaning agents. We clean it down with Clorox, we remove all the stuff, we wrap the body. Once we wrap the body, nobody is able to open the body again. They are not able to open our body bags until the funeral. It is then taken to the morgue. Now, at the morgue you are given a time period in which you need to come for the body of course."
Timothy Seguro - Acting CEO, KHMH
"The preparation there are strict guidelines as to how it gets done, what decontamination, takes place and then after that what containment process takes place and then after that what containment process takes place, once that is being done at the same time if the physician has time as soon as possible then they update the family however it should not come as a surprise to the family as the condition of that patient should have been updated to the family on a regular process on a regular daily basis so they should be expecting what could be the outcome, no."
But COVID or not, you can't exactly prepare for the death of a loved one, and as you've heard these deaths are made all the harder by the mandatory separation between the living and the dead.
But if all sanitary measures are observed a viewing is a risk that some families are willing to take. Lisa Moir say she does her best to accommodate them in their time of pain.
Lisa Tillett Moir
"I always do that and you know several persons would come back to me and say Miss, thank you miss you don't understand what that means but I do understand because I've lost my loved ones and I do understand that is why sometimes I literally fight with certain persons because these people must get their closure."
And if you find yourself in the position of having to retrieve the death certificate for a loved one who's died from COVID the hospital's advice is to have all your information in order.
That means both your social security card and the social security card of the deceased person, and also be prepared to answer questions relating to the occupation, marital status, address, and correct age of your loved one.
We were advised that turn around time for a death certificate is currently 24 hours depending on the availability of the physician.
Over 400 Belizeans have died from COVID 19.
