The Permanent Secretary for Health Doctor James Fong says if you do not live with your mother, please do not add to her bubble by travelling to see her today.
He says we have to keep our mums safe by staying home.
Doctor Fong is stressing that Fijians must continue to strictly follow the COVID-safe measures despite no new cases of COVID-19 confirmed today after another 2206 tests.
He says our personal “bubble” consists of all other people we interact with –– the people who could, potentially, infect us with COVID.
Doctor Fong says these are the people who share our space, at home, at work, on a bus, anywhere we might be.
He stresses that if you share a home with others, and you then interact with people outside of your home, all those new people not only join your bubble, they join the bubble of everyone you live with.
If you attended the Maternal and Child Health Clinic at Raiwaqa Health Centre from April 21st to April 23rd, April 29th to April 30th and May 3rd to May 5th remain at home and contact 158.
This has been stressed by the Permanent Secretary for Health Doctor James Fong as contact tracing continues for the nurse from the Raiwaqa Health Centre who has tested positive for COVID-19.
Doctor Fong says they know that the rest of the staff in the health centre have tested negative so far, and the nurse was wearing a mask while at work, however, they need anyone who attended the Maternal and Child Health Clinic on those days to call 158.
Ministry of Health's Head of Health Protection, Doctor Aalisha Sahukhan has confirmed that 12 COVID-19 patients have now recovered.
She says this leaves 37 active cases remaining in isolation facilities.
Of these 37 cases, 8 are border quarantine cases, 23 are of local transmission and 6 are still under investigation to determine the source of transmission.
Dr. Sahukhan says Fiji has had 136 cases in total with 96 recoveries now, and three deaths since our first case was detected on March 19th, 2020.
A total of 63,609, COVID-19 tests have been conducted with a daily average of 16,153 tests per day over the last seven days while 2,206 tests conducted yesterday.
Permanent Secretary for Health, Doctor James Fong says 15 contacts of the nurse from the Raiwaqa Health Centre have been identified through the careFIJI app.
He says their contact tracers have spent the past 24 hours working through the travel histories of their seven cases announced yesterday.
Dr Fonh says the nurse from Raiwaqa Health Centre had her careFIJI app downloaded and activated.
He says this is another reminder that the app works, and is an important tool in our fight against the virus.
Please download the careFiji app and keep your bluetooth on.
Permanent Secretary for Health, Doctor James Fong says people who have moved from containment zones into non-containment zones today will need to self-isolate themselves immediately.
He says they are tracking these people as best as they can.
Fong says they had made an accommodation yesterday to allow people on Viti Levu who needed to return to their homes to enter containment areas but they have seen a dangerous abuse of this policy from this morning.
The Permanent Secretary says they have seen one life lost to this outbreak but still, some people are not taking this situation seriously enough.
He has stressed that tightly-controlled movement is allowed so that Fijians can return home if, and only if, they reside in a containment area.
Fong says no other reason for cross-border travel into containment areas is allowed, including for cleaning services, a request they actually received multiple times.
He says he cannot believe some people have the audacity to ask the Ministry about this.
The Ministry of Commerce, Trade, Tourism and Transport will be providing transportation for those people who wish to leave a containment area to travel to another containment area today.
This was highlighted by the Health Ministry’s Chief Medical Advisor Doctor Jemesa Tudravu who says there are some requirements and criteria which will be needed to be fulfilled by the people.
He says the buses will operate at 50% capacity to allow for full physical distancing and there will be a limitation of movement inside the bus.
Dr Tudravu says a police officer will be boarding the bus as well and accompanying the bus for the whole journey to ensure that there is no unauthorised stop along the way, and in particular in areas.
He says the buses will be allowed to pick up passengers on their way back from one containment area to another.
He adds the bus driver and passengers are expected to have downloaded the careFIJI app and should be switched on for the whole duration of the trip and this will be checked prior to boarding the bus.
People can access the exact time, and the movement of the buses, company names and where the buses are leaving from the bus station on the Fijian Government website and Facebook page.
The Health Ministry’s Chief Medical Advisor Doctor Jemesa Tudravu says the Fiji Emergency Medical Assistance Team Field Hospitals at the old Government Supplies building in Natokowaqa and Nadovu Park in Lautoka will be operational from today.
Dr Tudravu says their medical teams are providing support and are on standby at the Punjas Health Centre and other facilities that are providing services to the people.
He says Punjas Health Centre will be providing 24-hours general outpatient services supported by their FEMAT Team and Viseisei Health Centre will be providing services for pregnant mothers.
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