Archives 2021

Press Statement

COVID-19 Update

 Tuesday, 1st June 2021

In addition to the 26 cases announced today, we now report 9 new cases this evening.

5 of the cases are linked to the Navosai Narere cluster, and 1 to the Waila cluster. 1 is from the Nawaka cluster and works at Nadi hospital and 2 have been detected at CWM Hospital.

In addition to the Nadi hospital worker, further investigation has also revealed that a case announced over the weekend from the Nawaka cluster, who was discovered as part of screening and contact tracing in that area, had given birth and been discharged from the hospital a week ago. Furthermore, another previously announced positive case had spent significant time as a visitor in the hospital just prior to being positive. All staff and patients currently in the hospital are being tested. In response to these cases, the Nadi hospital will be locked down, and services will be relocated. Our Chief Medical Advisor will further elaborate on this matter tonight.

As stated 2 of the new cases of COVID-19 have been detected at the Colonial War Memorial Hospital in Suva.

The first detected case is a patient from Labasa who was admitted at CWM six weeks ago. She was swabbed as part of the exit protocol before her scheduled transfer to Labasa Hospital. It is suspected that she caught the virus from either another patient, visitor or staff during her admission at CWM Hospital.

The second case at the CWM Hospital is a nurse. She developed symptoms and was swabbed and isolated as part of the hospital’s existing surveillance program. The nurse worked in a different part of the hospital to the positive patient, and at this early stage in the investigation, no connection has been made between her and the patient, or any known clusters.

As an early part of the response to the outbreak in Central Division – frontline health staff had been removed from their places of residence and housed in bubbles in accommodation facilities across Suva. These staff have been separated from their families for weeks on end in order to safeguard our essential health services. This nurse had been working within a bubble and was housed at the Holiday Inn.

The detection of these 2 cases within the hospital will require measures to secure the hospital and its staff and patients. The existing protocol for weeks has been to isolate every new admission and their carer, and have them swabbed and tested before allowing admission into wards within the hospital. Hospital staff were tested if they had symptoms, or if they were residents of an area with reported COVID-19 cases. Staff in the COVID-19 isolation ward were tested more regularly – with negative results required before ending their rotation through that ward.

In response to these recent cases, all patients, their carers, and all staff at CWM will now be swabbed and tested in order to gauge the extent of any spread within the hospital. This is an estimated 1200 people who will be tested overnight.

We are currently conducting evaluations to determine which areas with CWM need to be locked down and what services need to be curtailed, and we are establishing procedures to keep critical services functioning safely. For the time being, all non-emergency outpatient services will cease including the special outpatients department. The wards of concern in the East and West Wings have been put on lockdown. These are the Acute Medical Ward, Acute Surgical Ward, Beqa Ward, and ANZ Ward.

Emergency services will continue at CWM. The Emergency Department is functioning and inpatient pediatrics and obstetrics services will continue. The Maternity Ward and Children’s wing are still in operation but all access to these areas from other parts of the hospital have been closed. The data from the overnight testing will determine how the existing contingency plans will be reviewed and what further measures will be implemented.

Press Statement

COVID-19 Afternoon Update

Tuesday 1^st June, 2021

Transmission Update

We have recorded 26 cases as of this morning. All these new cases are linked to existing clusters. All are stable and either in isolation facilities or home isolation.

At the present time, the vast majority of cases have been arising from existing clusters and not as cases with unknown sources of transmission from the community. This indicates that our contact tracing and the isolation of communities where infections are found is effective; however, we will continue to escalate our community surveillance program to look for cases outside clusters and the contained areas.

The new cases are linked to the following clusters:

• Navy cluster – 23
• Extra Supermarket cluster – 1
• Nawaka, Nadi cluster – 2

There are currently 293 active cases, 17 of these cases are from Nadi, and 276 are within the Lami-Nausori containment zone. We have recorded a total of 464 cases in Fiji since the first case in March of last year, with 394 during the current outbreak.

We are also aware of the increasing danger posed to our health facilities and will be escalating our mitigation measures. This will include setting up field hospitals and more quarantine and isolation facilities. As such this may involve temporarily taking over assets for this purpose.

Vaccination Update

Yesterday we administered 12,572 first doses and 134 second doses, thus a total of 12,706 vaccinations across Viti Levu, a record for one day. Thanks and congratulations to all Fijians who braved the rain to get vaccinated and the vaccination teams that made it possible.

Cumulatively we have now vaccinated 148,522 individuals with their first dose of the vaccine. This is 28% of the target population, which is people aged 18 and older in Fiji. 4,251 individuals, which is 3% of the target population, have received their 2nd dose and are considered fully vaccinated.

Priority has been in Viti Levu because that is where the current outbreak is centred. Breakdown by division is:

Western Division: 32% first dose/6% second dose
Central Division: 32% first dose/0.66% second dose
Northern 12% first dose/1% second dose
Eastern Division: 10% first dose/no second doses

Screening and Testing Update

5,575 individuals were screened at stationary screening clinics yesterday, and 9.4% were swabbed and tested. Mobile screening clinics screened 4,602 individuals and swabbed 279, or 6%.

Media Release
COVID-19 Update

Monday May 31st 2021

Evening update

In addition to the 23 cases reported from this morning, there are 9 new cases to report as of 6 pm this evening. The 9 new cases are all linked to existing clusters.

Muanikoso, Nasinu- 5
Nawaka, Nadi – 4

There are now 267 active cases with 252 of these cases from the Lami-Suva-Nausori containment zone, and 15 cases from Nadi. 2 of the active cases in Suva are considered to be severe cases.

Fiji has had 438 cases in total since our first case was reported in March 2020, with 167 recoveries and 4 deaths. There have been 368 cases since this outbreak started in April 2021.

Testing update

65,877 COVID-19 laboratory tests have been conducted during this current outbreak, with 108,738 conducted in total since testing started in early 2020. This does not yet include the 11,000 samples recently tested in Australia.

A total of 2475 samples were tested yesterday. The daily average of testing over the last 7 days is 2630 tests per day. At the national level, an average of 3 tests per 1000 population was conducted daily over the last 7 days. The 7-day average daily test positivity is 1.1%.

Press Statement

COVID-19 Update

Sunday 30th May, 2021

Statement by Permanent Secretary for the Ministry of Health and Medical Services, Dr James Fong.

We recorded 18 new cases yesterday and another 23 new cases so far today. All of these cases are linked to existing clusters.
The 18 cases from yesterday are linked to the following clusters:

-Narere cluster – 9
-Waila cluster – 5
-Muanikoso cluster – 1
-Navy cluster – 1
-Korociri Nadi – 2
The two in Nadi are linked to each other and are from the Korociri Settlement near Nawaka village, which is now under lockdown.

The 23 cases today are as follows: 15 are part of the Navy cluster (including 1 from Nadonumai in Lami, and 3 from Khalsa), 7 are part of the Waila cluster, 1 is part of the Nadali cluster.

We can now confirm that all 46 cases announced on Friday were generated from known clusters. The 3 that were under investigation are now known to be from the Navy cluster. This is reassuring in that the cases coming from our screening areas and tests coming from non-screening areas remain negative.

We have recorded 401 cases in Fiji since the first case was detected in March of last year, with 164 recoveries and 4 deaths. There have been 331 cases since this outbreak started in April. Over 60,000 COVID-19 tests have been conducted since this outbreak, with over 103,566 since we started testing early last year.

There were 3 recoveries yesterday, which means there are now 233 active cases. 2 of the active cases are in Nadi, and 231 in the Suva-Lami-Nausori containment zone. 2 of the current active cases are considered severe and are admitted at the CWM Hospital.

As regards the cases in Nadi: Before yesterday, the last case recorded in Nadi was on May 12. This means that the Nadi containment zone went more than 1 incubation period of 14 days before registering another case, despite high levels of testing. But we knew this was not long enough. We always expected that we might see cases emerge again in Nadi and Lautoka.  We were never COVID-free; we could only contain the virus. We have seen this experience replicated in many countries around the world; where certain areas go through a prolonged phase of no cases and then one case suddenly emerges. We have seen this same theme play out on the world stage as well – countries that were seen as success stories in containing the virus (Vietnam, Thailand, Singapore, Mongolia)  have recently had to contend with large outbreaks. This highlights the point: no country is safe until every country is safe and for Fiji, nowhere is safe until everywhere is safe.

This is why we must emphasize that there is no ‘us against them’. Just because you don’t have cases recorded in your area does not mean that you are safe. It is not Suva against Nadi or other parts of Fiji. We are all in this together, and we must combine ALL our resources to stop the virus where we know it is spreading. Our health teams know this. And this is why we had health staff from Labasa and Suva assisting in Lautoka during the sequestration of Lautoka Hospital. Now, with the lifting of the sequestration, those same staff are coming to help in Suva.

In the same vein, as our operations move on we will need to create more quarantine and isolation facilities. I ask that the general public help us by accepting these facilities in or near their communities and understand that these facilities are safe.. They are carefully controlled and pose no danger. Quarantine and isolation facilities are a necessary part of our battle to be COVID-contained, and we need them.

Our strategy to contain this virus has been the same
-Rapidly find cases, isolate and test them, find and quarantine their contacts
-Reduce unnecessary movement of people in containment zones and instil COVID-Safe behaviours and practices to stop the virus moving and spreading

The first part of the strategy is largely in the hands of the health teams and our partners – though we also need people to come forward to get tested if they have symptoms or are contacts of cases. But the second strategy is in the hands of everyone. It is human behaviour that finally determines how well we can stop the spread. Our capacity to stop this virus is really in the hands of every Fijian. It only works if the people act with extreme caution and follow the recommended protocols.  We can only limit our vulnerability by promoting, using and enforcing COVID-safe behaviours and practices.

Unfortunately, funeral gatherings are a major concern as regards the spread of virus. Another factor that is promoting spread is that many people are gathering in a limited space such as large families at home, dormitory-style living, crowded settlements and crowded work spaces with poor ventilation.

The response is therefore obvious:
1. Limit the size of funeral-related gatherings. This seems to be the most important strategy now. We need 10 persons only at the burial site. Funeral gatherings before and after the burials need to be discouraged strongly as they generate the most Covid-unsafe behaviour. If they need to happen, we need to limit them to 10 persons or fewer and to no more than 1 hour.

2. Protect your personal space at home and at work by making sure you maintain Covid-safe measures at all times, whether you are in your home or outside your home. Do not engage in any gatherings outside of your home. Avoid crowds and contained spaces, and keep washing your hands.

Grog Drinking: We have been seeing in recent weeks that a number of infected individuals have reported drinking grog with others in their cluster, and we have reason to believe that grog drinking is becoming a significant factor in the spread of the virus. Grog drinking involves close contact with others and drinking out of a common cup, which create perfect conditions for the virus to spread from one person to another. Grog drinking is an important part of our culture and our social life in Fiji, but we must ask that people refrain from sharing grog with people from outside their household during this pandemic period. Don’t invite anyone to your house, don’t go to anyone else’s house, don’t share a bowl with colleagues after work, or during work or in any other place.

Vaccination Update
We administered 36,885 vaccinations from 24 to 29 May: 33,077 first doses and 3,808 second doses. We have administered 136,247 doses in total. A new shipment of vaccines arrived in the country today, and we will be continuing our vaccination programme next week. Once this new batch of vaccines is used up we will have given the first dose of the vaccine to 260,000 people in Fiji in total.

My final message is that I realise that many of you are tired and weary, and that your patience is running thin. Unfortunately, COVID is not tired of you. Because this is a long-term battle, we need to make allowances along the way and change our strategies when necessary to adapt and avoid unintended consequences.