West Indies submerged by unprecedented fourth wave of Covid-19

A few days after Martinique, it is now Guadeloupe’s turn to shut itself up. Friday August 13, at 7 p.m. local, the measures to tighten the confinement, announced the day before by the prefect of Guadeloupe, Alexandre Rochatte, came into force in the archipelago. Limitation of travel within a radius of five kilometers around the home – against ten kilometers until then -, start of the curfew one hour earlier, from 7 p.m., until 5 a.m., closure of non-essential shops as well as places of culture and leisure, access to beaches only allowed for the practice of sporting activities, within the limit of five kilometers … In short, a draconian turn of the screw compared to the partial confinement which had been established on August 4.

These new instructions must remain in effect until 1^er September. “From now on, everyone must stay at home, at their home, unless they have essential activities to perform”, ordered Mr. Rochatte, Wednesday August 11. “In the next three weeks, it is imperative that we avoid social interactions, except those that are essential”, also underlined the prefect.

And for good reason: since the beginning of the month, the Antilles archipelago has been swept by a fourth wave of the Covid-19 epidemic of unprecedented virulence. With each bulletin of the regional health agency (ARS) of Guadeloupe, the epidemic indicators are a little more dizzy. On Friday, the latest ARS situation update reported 1,200 contaminations per day in this territory of 390,000 inhabitants. Three quarters are awarded to the Delta variant. The seven-day rolling incidence rate was 2,016 new cases per 100,000 population. In other words, one in fifty Guadeloupe residents tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 the week of August 6 to 12. This is unheard of in a French department since the start of the pandemic.

The hospital system “in great tension”

The corollary of this dizzying increase in the number of Covid-19 cases is a rapid increase in the number of patients hospitalized in the two main establishments of the archipelago, the university hospital center (CHU), in Pointe-à-Pitre, and the Basse-Terre hospital center (CHBT), in the capital of the department. As of August 13, the two hospitals were welcoming a total of 124 patients with Covid-19. Of the 65 patients in intensive care in Guadeloupe, 54 had Covid-19. And none of them were vaccinated against the disease.

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