Page 11 - Florida Sentinel 5-1-20

COVID-19
100% Of Saint Lucia's COVID-19 Patients Have Recovered, Says Nation's Chief Medical Officer
Saint Lucia, an island na- tion in the Caribbean, has an- nounced a 100% recovery rate for all 15 patients who had the coronavirus in the country. The country’s chief medical officer, Dr. Sharon Belmar- George, made the announce- ment on Wednesday.
“To date, all of the positive cases of COVID-19 in Saint Lucia have recovered, with the remaining two cases who were in isolation receiving negative COVID-19 results and have since been discharged from the hospital,” she said. “This now places Saint Lucia at the 100% recovery rate of all COVID-19 cases."
Belmar-George said the patients included people who were considered high risk, such as the elderly and individuals with chronic illness.
"They too recovered well, with no complications," the doctor said.
She added that laboratory testing is still continuing "lo- cally and with the support of the Caribbean Public Health Agency laboratory."
DR. SHARON BELMAR-GEORGE
Avocados Are In, Pork Bellies Out In Era Of Pandemic Eating
The pandemic has totally transformed the way the world eats.
There is no trend, exactly, other than this: People want comfort. They also want to eat their way to stronger immune systems. They’re stress baking, but they’re also eating healthier than they would have at restau- rants. Avocados are in. Pork belly out. Frozen pizzas and in- stant noodles are selling out.
And these seemingly con- flicting and converging buying patterns are upending agricul- tural markets, sending prices for avocados surging more than 60% from early March, while butter is tumbling because of the loss of restaurant demand.
Any way you cut it, the coronavirus has “completely changed everything,” said Syl- vain Charlebois, a professor and senior director of the agri- food analytics lab at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Canada.
“People are more con- cerned about putting food on the table than anything else,” he said. “That really changes the mindset of a consumer.”
Some of these trends could be here to stay, experts say. Now that some people have gone back to packaged foods, they may be surprised to see the quality improvements for these products and keep buying them even in the post-quaran- tine world. Cooking more at home might also continue well after the lockdowns end.
‘Health Halo’
Avocados are one of the foods that have seen a surpris- ing price surge in the last few weeks. When lockdown meas- ures first went into effect, farm- ers in Mexico, the world’s top producer, started slowing har- vest activities, anticipating a demand drop-off.
But it turns out avocado
toast and guacamole are prov- ing to be stay-at-home fa- vorites. Demand has been much higher than the growers were expecting, and that’s sent prices surging. A box of Hass avocados from the state of Mi- choacan, Mexico’s biggest pro- ducer, cost about 490 pesos ($20) on Monday, according to the government. That’s up 63% from 300 pesos in early March.
“There is a general health- halo over all fresh produce items,” said Roland Fumasi, analyst for RaboResearch, in Fresno California.
It might be the vitamin C content in citrus that prompted the buying as consumers look to boost their immune systems. Orange juice, once a breakfast staple that had fallen out of favor because of its high sugar content, also got a boost. Fu- tures traded in New York are up about 17% since the end of February.
FRIDAY, MAY 1, 2020 FLORIDA SENTINEL BULLETIN PUBLISHED EVERY TUESDAY AND FRIDAY PAGE 11-A