Omicron’s Transmission Rate Concerning

With fifty percent of Belize’s population fully vaccinated, we are still a long way to go in terms of lowering the number of active cases by community.  According to Doctor Natalia Beer, the transmissibility of the new variant will see a rapid multiplication of cases.

Dr. Natalia Beer, Technical Advisor, Maternal Child Health

“In ten days, one infected person can transmit the virus to seventy-two persons, hence the reason for the public health measures and if we only can say three, well getting vaccinated is on the top of the list.  Second, wear the face mask and the physical distancing.  Those are the three most important ways of preventing the community transmission of COVID-19.  This is nothing new, vaccination coverage really protects the population.  We are at this level, fifty percent of persons with complete COVID-19 vaccination, meaning that we still have risks of a lot of persons getting infected.  When we reach to a coverage of ninety-five percent we may have one or two cases per community that may get infected, so we have a long way to go still yet.”