COVID mortality rate increases in The Bahamas amid spate of deaths

COVID mortality rate increases in The Bahamas amid spate of deaths

NASSAU, BAHAMAS — While The Bahamas’ rate of deaths among people infected with the novel coronavirus remains in line with global standards, that rate has doubled in less than a month amid a spate of COVID-19-related deaths.

The case fatality rate, which calculates the number of deaths compared to the total number of cases, is a measure of the “deadliness of a disease”, according to health officials.

By mid-August, there were 1,315 confirmed cases and 18 deaths related to the virus, representing a case fatality rate (CFR) of just 1.3 percent — well in line with global standards.

The death toll from the virus as of Monday was 59.

There have been 2,585 confirmed cases of the virus.

This represents a CFR rate of 2.28 percent.

The CFR among other jurisdictions, including developed countries, ranges between 0.1 percent and more than 28 percent.

For example, Yemen, one of the poorest countries in the Middle East, has 1,994 confirmed cases and 576 deaths from the virus, representing a CFR rate of 28 percent.

Jamaica has a CFR rate of just over one percent — 34 deaths and 3,183 confirmed cases.

Amid continued sourcing of PCR test kits and the reagents to perform testing via GeneXpert machines at Princess Margaret Hospital, health officials have been able to steadily increase COVID-19 testing over the last few weeks.

Testing increased from just over 7,000 in mid-August to over 13,000 this week.

Amid the first wave of the virus, which spanned from mid-March to early July, health officials said the CFR rate was expected to decline as more testing was performed and cases recorded.

In less than a two-week period, there were 18-COVID-19 deaths in The Bahamas.

As of August 28, there were 40 COVID-related-deaths and 10 deaths under investigation.

By Monday, the number of confirmed deaths had risen to 59 with an additional 15 cases under investigation.

Canada has recorded more than 132,142 infections and 9,146 deaths.

This places Canada’s CFR at 6.9 percent.

Brazil, which has recovered more than 4.1 million cases of the virus since the pandemic, has a death toll of 127,464. This represents a case fatality rate of 3.1 percent.

There have been over 353,000 cases in the United Kingdom.

It has recorded around 41,500 COVID-related, among the worst in Europe.

The UK has a CFR rate of 11.7 percent.

France has a CFR rate of 9.1 percent — over 335,500 confirmed cases and more than 30,700 deaths.

This is more than half of its CFR rate of 19 percent back in May.

That month, The Bahamas’ CFR rate stood at 11.9 percent.

At the time there were 11 COVID-19-related deaths and 96 confirmed cases in the country.

The global average was an average of 3.4 percent, though according to data the CFR rate among older people was estimated to be much higher — around 14.8 percent among those over 80-years-old, compared to 3.6 percent among those between the ages of 60 and 69.

About Royston Jones Jr.

Royston Jones Jr. is a senior digital reporter and occasional TV news anchor at Eyewitness News. Since joining Eyewitness News as a digital reporter in 2018, he has done both digital and broadcast reporting, notably providing the electoral analysis for Eyewitness News’ inaugural election night coverage, “Decision Now 2021”.