NASSAU, BAHAMAS — Health officials confirmed one additional coronavirus death yesterday, taking the total number of COVID-19 deaths in The Bahamas to 15.
The latest death was reflected on the Ministry of Health’s daily dashboard; however, no further details were provided up to press time.
Last week, Chief Medical Officer Pearl McMillian said officials were investigating as much as three deaths believed to be COVID-19 related.
“The difficulty is getting all of the information to be able to determine whether or not a case that was not outright COVID-19 actually fits on the death certificate that COV-19 will be the major cause that death,” McMillian said during a press conference on Friday.
“Certainly, I’m aware of at least three additional ones that are under investigation now,” McMillian said.
“We will go forward as those deaths occur. We will go through the necessary process of having a small committee review all of the contributing factors and then we will be able to say concretely or not whether it was a COVID-19 death or a COVID-19 associated death.”
On July 13, the ministry advised that its dashboard would be updated to include a tab for “non-COVID related deaths”.
This would classify a patient that was diagnosed with COVID-19, but the cause of death was not due to COVID-19.
This classification followed the deaths of two individuals, who were previously confirmed to have the virus, and a review was conducted which determined that the deaths were not due to COVID-19.
During Friday’s press conference, Health minister Renward Wells warned the country to brace for more COVID-19 deaths.
“We continue to pray for the minimal loss of life but we have lost 14 souls to COVID-19, three during this surge,” he said.
“With increasing hospitalization the country must brace itself to experience more deaths from COVID-19.”
Yesterday, the number of COVID-19 cases climbed to 898 — an increase of 20 new cases.
Of the new cases, there were 15 in Grand Bahama, and five in New Providence.
As of yesterday, there were 777 active cases, including 35 in hospital.
