CMO says Chikungunya is not Escalating, It is Moderating

(ZIZ News) — Chikungunya in St. Kitts-Nevis is not escalating, rather, it is moderating.

So said the country’s Chief Medical Officer, Dr. Patrick Martin in a conversion with ZIZ Reporter Jaedee Caines.

Dr. Martin said the determination was made on Tuesday at a meeting of the Ministry of Health’s Epidemiology Surveillance Team [EST].

“We are projecting a downward trend shortly, consistent with what’s happening in neighbouring countries for example, my colleague in Dominica, Dr. David Johnson Chief Medical Officer, reported earlier this week that they are seeing a downward trend. Now they started having chikungunya before us so if they’re going down we expect to be going down too because in the OECS, we are all in the same neighbourhood,” he noted.

The Chief Medical Officer also reminded residents of St. Kitts and Nevis to be on the lookout for conditions that encourage breeding in the Aedes aegypti mosquito.

He said, “We have had a deluge of rain recently and so, I must use the opportunity to ask, beg, plead and beseech people to look around their houses and yards and the neighbouring lots…for anything that could collect water, anything. Even a leaf of a banana tree, because the mosquito does not live in swamps.”