Pacific island nations that are some of the last places in the world to be hit by the COVID-19 pandemic are recording a growing number of cases, prompting a rush to provide vaccines, medical teams and food aid.
Concern about the detection of COVID-19 in tsunami-hit Tonga, where one new case was recorded yesterday, has been heightened by thousands of infections sweeping neighboring Pacific islands.
In the Solomon Islands, where political riots in November last year resulted in buildings being burned in the capital, Honiara, an outbreak of 2,357 cases of the Delta variant of SARS-CoV-2 has overwhelmed the health system, aid agencies said.
Australia has sent four flights to the Solomon Islands in the past two weeks to deliver a medical team, vaccines, and emergency food for hospital patients and tens of thousands of households.
Katie Greenwood, head of delegation for the International Federation of Red Cross Pacific, said that cases had increased rapidly in the Solomon Islands, where just 11 percent of the population is fully vaccinated.
“People are scared and its affecting everyone,” she said. “Fragile health systems get overwhelmed very quickly.”
The Solomon Islands government has reported 21 deaths from COVID-19, and imposed restrictions on movement.
Solomon Islands National University professor Transform Aqorau said that Honiara has been shut off, causing a scarcity of fresh food, and he had been eating from one plant in his garden.
“They have blocked Honiara in, vendors from outside can’t come in,” he said.
He credited essential workers for keeping the power and water running, despite increasing numbers of staff testing positive and needing to isolate.
The rush for vaccination had also caused crowding with “a high level of lack of obedience to social distancing,” he said.
Vaccination sites closed from Wednesday to prevent the spread of the virus to health workers and the public, the health ministry said in a statement, adding that it would “restrategize” distribution.
An Australian medical team has also been sent to Kiribati, which has 913 cases after allowing a flight with returning nationals to land last month, its first outbreak since lifting border restrictions.
Palau, where 99 percent of the population of 18,000 is vaccinated, recorded 2,115 COVID-19 cases in a month.
Tonga recorded its first community transition of COVID-19 on Tuesday, after two workers at a cargo wharf were infected. There are now five cases.
An influx of tsunami aid brought by foreign navy ships has been delivered without contact with Tongan people, and pallets are quarantined for 72 hours.
Greenwood said that Pacific islands had worked hard for two years to keep COVID-19 out, but new strains were more virulent and harder to detect. There could be a gap “that allows COVID to get in,” she said.
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