A Twelfth Person Dies from COVID-19; 58 New Cases Identified

A twelfth person dies from COVID-19 in Belize. The most recent data released from the Office of the Director of Health Services confirmed late this evening that another person who was at a private institution in Orange Walk has died and that the post-mortem showed the individual was COVID-positive. The victim is David Wall of Indian Creek Village in the Orange Walk District. This is the third person to succumb from that district in less than a week; siblings Natalio Wicab and Telly Cruz succumbed within two days of each other in the village of San Felipe.  Orange Walk now accounts for the highest number of cases and deaths as a result of COVID-19.  There are also fifty-eight new infected persons. A batch of two hundred and fifty-five samples was processed of which approximately twenty-three percent returned positive. The country is now recording eight hundred and eighteen positive cases since the first case was identified.  In the breakdown of today’s figures, Corozal District recorded nine new cases in Buena Vista and Patchakan Villages and the town. There was one each detected in Roaring Creek Village and San Ignacio Town for the Cayo District.  Twenty new cases were identified in Belize District, seventeen of which were for Belize City, two for San Pedro and there is an additional case in Caye Caulker.  Orange Walk District recorded the highest number of twenty-seven. Those are from the town as well as August Pine Ridge, Guinea Grass, Trial Farm, San Estevan, San Pablo and Trinidad Villages. There were no new cases in San Felipe. Among the new cases are two employees from B.S.I. where contact tracing and sanitization is ongoing. As we said, Orange Walk has now become the area with the highest number of cases, two hundred and forty-three to date, surpassing San Pedro which is recording two hundred and twenty-nine. Belize District has one hundred and fifty-nine. Of note is that fifty-four persons have recovered from the virus.