Listening to the news at midday today, I heard a report of an update given by Minister of Health Christopher Tufton about the current situation with the zika virus here in Jamaica. As the news report was read, I madly tried to scribble down the figures being given…number of reported, suspected and confirmed cases, etc. I was particularly interested in the number of pregnant women reported with suspected cases of zika. I thought I heard 88, and began to comb the news sites online and on social media to see if I could track down the figure. No luck. I was about to send Minister Tufton a tweet or to call Power 106 to see if I could speak with someone in their news room.
And then I decided to check the Ministry of Health website, though I had little hope of finding any current figures there, based on past experience.
Eureka! Look what I found! A downloadable, written document entitled “Zika update as at June 25, 2016“, posted on the website today, July 5, 2016! Hallelujah!
Seriously though, this is a significant development in keeping the public informed, that on the same day the Minister gives an update to the media, a document containing the figures is posted on the MOH website. I sincerely hope that this is the beginning of a trend.
The full document (3 pages long) is available on the website and I have included it here: MOH Zika-update-of-as-at-June-25
Of particular note are the general update regarding number of cases, with 24 confirmed cases as of June 25, 2016:
and the number of pregnant women with suspected cases of zika:
Providing reliable, easily accessible official information to the public on a regular basis is essential during a public health situation such as this.
July 5, 2016 at 2:09 pm
Yay! Minister Tufton HAS been listening to you (and reading our tweets!) I am glad to see this and hope that they will keep it up!
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July 5, 2016 at 6:35 pm
I do hope that the Ministry continues to post this type of update, Emma! So necessary!
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July 5, 2016 at 5:16 pm
Reblogged this on Petchary's Blog and commented:
Here is some good news, in terms of the sharing of information from the Ministry of Health. My fellow blogger Susan Goffe has been following the “Zika Saga” very closely and has been concerned that the stats have not been posted regularly on the Ministry website. So this is good, and I thought I would share her post with you.
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