The black symbol in Suriname hospitals: “It is very touching”

A complete lockdown has been announced in Suriname for the next two and a half weeks. For hospitals, the black code is being implemented as of Monday, for Suriname as the purple country code, it is the highest risk. Within Surinamese society there are many concerns about family members who live in Suriname.

Sasha Rowling is a doctor at a hospital in Paramaribo. “People arrive exhausted because they haven’t received the right treatment for a while.” Rowling believes that the young age of the patients is the most violent. “Forty-year-old people die an hour after being hospitalized.” She says there is no longer a place for these folks in the IC or a room for a ventilator.

Concerns about relatives in Suriname

Roy Carter, host of the radio show Mart, gets calls daily from listeners interested in the situation in Suriname. “What you’re hearing is that people are very anxious about their loved ones,” says Carter. Amsterdam residents on the street are also anxious. “Mother and grandmother still lives there, so I’m worried about my family.”

The Netherlands will send vaccines

The Dutch Ministry of Health announced on Friday that it will send between 500,000 to 750,000 AstraZeneca vaccines to Suriname due to the risky situation. These vaccines will be delivered by the end of June at the earliest. “The numbers are skyrocketing, so by the end of the month there will be a very large number of deaths. Not just the dead, but the very sick people, too,” Rowling says of the late delivery. “The more the better.”