7-member FEMAT team travels to Tuvalu in response to COVID-19

A 7-member team from the Fiji Emergency Medical Assistance Team has left our shores for Tuvalu in response to a request from the Tuvalu Government and World Health Organisation to support their COVID-19 response.

While bidding the team farewell, Health Minister Dr Ifereimi Waqainabete says he is proud of the team as they represent the 7,000 employees in the ministry, and it shows that they have the capabilities as the team are WHO certified.

He says since its verification in 2019, FEMAT has been deployed locally in natural disasters such as cyclones, flooding, COVID-19 and outbreak response, including leading outreach programs that have surgical capacity.

After more than two-and-a-half years without any community transmission of COVID-19, Tuvalu is now responding to its first community cases since the beginning of the pandemic.

Routine surveillance uncovered two cases on the 2nd of this month that could not be linked to recent travel, making Tuvalu the last full WHO Member State in the Western Pacific Region to experience community transmission of COVID-19.