PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad - Following confirmation late Wednesday by the Caribbean Public Health Agency (Carpha) of six local cases of Influenza A/H1N1, better known as swine flu, the first response from Health Minister Dr Fuad Khan was that such cases were “nothing new” for T&T. The minister’s biggest concern was avoiding “overreaction and over-treatment,” which he said occurred in 2009 when swine flu cases first emerged in this country.
Dr Khan should be equally concerned, however, about ensuring all the necessary public health systems and protocols are in place and there is sufficient awareness about this potentially fatal disease. There has already been one death among four confirmed cases in Barbados and six confirmed cases in St Vincent and the Grenadines, two of T&T’s closest neighbours in a region where people move freely from one island to the next.