If the COVID-19 “virus was in the population for that length of time (there would be) many more deaths,” Dr Avery Hinds, the Technical Director of Epidemiology at the Ministry of Health, said on Monday in reference to a  local newspaper report that there were 489 respiratory deaths over the past four months in Trinidad and Tobago. “If indeed COVID- 19 was in the population for the length of time that was alluded to many more deaths would have been seen, the hospitals would have been full,” Dr Hinds said.

“The last four months of data was used in a vacuum. We don’t have any context to interpret. This is a dangerous use of data. “Globally once there is the introduction of COVID-19 virus into a population in a manner that is uncontrolled and unmaintained you get lots of spread, more people getting ill at the same time. Pneumonia by itself doesn’t equate to COVID-19, there are bacterial pneumonia, pneumonia which you get after you aspirate and a broad category of things you pick up just by looking at the term pneumonia,” he said at Monday’s news conference.

“Looking at data we do not see an increase in any of the respiratory illnesses’ deaths beyond what is expected and beyond what is currently in train, in line with the previous years’ flu seasons. This suggests to us there wasn’t an early and uncontrolled introduction of the virus. The rest of the mortality data shows that chronic diseases like heart disease, diabetes and cancer for example, still hold the top places. COVID-19 has not displaced chronic diseases as the top cause of death,” Dr Hinds explained.