BRIDGETOWN, Barbados (CMC) — Barbados’ Chief Medical Officer Dr Kenneth George disclosed Wednesday that the Ministry of Health is investigating the deaths of about two vaccinated people to determine if there was any link to the COVID-19 jab.

Speaking at the second of a series of town hall meetings being staged by the Government to get the public’s views on vaccination and testing, George said evidence has to be gathered before an association could be made between the vaccine and the deaths.

“There is a process we have to follow that involves multiple steps and it is only after we go through that rigorous process can we make the link,” he said.

No details were given about how long after getting vaccinated the individuals died.

“What I will tell you is that we are investigating one or two deaths,” George said.

The CMO insisted that the ministry was not trying to hide information, noting that local cases of adverse effects have been compiled and made public.

Senior Medical Officer of Health Dr Arthur Phillips, who was also in attendance at the meeting, said that of the more than 180,000 vaccine doses administered in Barbados so far, 442 adverse reactions were reported.

Of those, he said, three were “moderate to severe and potentially being connected to the vaccine”.

Under the National Vaccination Programme, 100,698 people have received first doses of the vaccine, while 82,088 persons – 30.3 per cent of the population – have been given second doses and are fully vaccinated.

On Wednesday, the Ministry of Health reported that 11 new cases of COVID-19, five males and six females, were identified from 1,081 tests conducted on Tuesday.

The new cases bring the number of people in isolation to 106.

A total of 4,496 confirmed cases of COVID-19 have been recorded since the start of the pandemic. In Barbados, 48 people have died from the viral illness.