Healthcare unaffected

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Wednesday’s island-wide blackout did not affect patient care. The assurance came from Minister of Health, Terrence Deyalsingh on Thursday evening.

In a brief comment to Guardian Media, Minister Deyalsingh said all backup systems kicked in and worked according to plan.

“Patient care was not compromised and things are now back to normal,” he said.

Since the incident, he said the standby generators were refuelled “and we are once again in a state of readiness.”

He thanked all Regional Health Authorities’ staff who, he said, “rose to the challenge to ensure our patients continued to receive care without major interruption.”

In a release, yesterday, the ministry noted there were no deaths in the public health system, which resulted from the national power outage contrary to rumours circulating.

“All public hospitals are equipped with emergency backup generators, which were utilised. Major hospitals also had onsite adequate diesel storage in the event the generators were needed beyond the usual generator run times. Where required, electrical supply was prioritised for critical areas, such as Intensive Care Units (ICU) and the Neonatal Intensive Care Units (NICU), to ensure continuity of care for these highest risk patients,” it said.

The release added that the vaccines were not impacted.

“Facilities which store vaccines at the local level (e.g. Offices of the County Medical Officers and District Health Facilities (DHF) are also equipped with backup generators for use in the event of a natural disaster or an electrical outage incident. In cases where no such equipment exists, the established contingency is to transfer the vaccines to storage facilities with adequate backup electricity supply. Vaccine temperatures are closely monitored and deviation in temperature is noted and reported to the Expanded Programme on Immunization at the Ministry of Health for further action,” it said.