Now I know what it feels like to be kidnapped and imprisoned! Well maybe that's a bit dramatic since my experience was nothing like that poor Colombian senator who was kidnapped and held by rebels for some seven years during which period she had a child (no doubt the result of rape) for one of the rebels.
So by comparison, my experience was by no means as frightening but it was a form of kidnapping and imprisonment anyway.
It started so simply, for after having a bout of fever and shivers on Friday 25th May and taking the usual home remedies and having the fever go away, to my surprise after a great day of riding to Lovers leap in St. Elizabeth from Spur Tree Hill in Manchester on Sunday, when I returned the fever suddenly reoccurred accompanied by chills.
By Monday morning the stubborn fever was still around, so I went to my doctor at Medical Associates Hospital to get some antibiotics. Problem was, my doctor was sick so they sent me to his colleague Charmaine Webb who I had known many years ago. When she heard about the fever going and coming, for some reason she looked up symptoms for malaria and asked me if I had been to any countries where they have the disease.
I mentioned that I had been in south America but had been back for over three weeks but that seems to have set off a panic as according to them Brazil has a serious malaria epidemic.That's when it was referred to a Dr. Kildere Donaldson who is supposed to be an expert in contagious diseases and he insisted that I had to be admitted for observation and the matter reported to the public health authorities for malaria had been eradicated from Jamaica and they were paranoid that it not return to the shores. I had to be admitted immediately they said so the necessary tests could be done.
Never having encountered a situation like this, I called to get legal advice but was told that my contact had no knowledge of public health law. So I called a friend had been the medical officer of health for St. Ann. His sober advice was that I go into hospital for observation and testing for if I didn't, the public health authorities could send the police for me and take me into the public hospital to be quarantined and tested.
Well that was enough to get me to go back and be admitted to Medical Associates where they put me in a private room, under a mosquito net and all! However, the net was open at the top so if any mosquitoes were around, they could have flown in and out in wild abandon, so happily, since I am terribly claustrophobic, I quickly abandoned it!!!
For two days, I was put through every possible test and I think they took away at least half of my blood and would you believe I never even had a temperature or chills for the entire time I was there .
Anyway, the hospital is not bad at all. The food good and all the staff nice but there is no place like home. So since I had absolutely no more symptoms, I was allowed to go home although the test results from the government lab were not yet not returned. (I hear those bureaucrats down there can take up to 2 weeks to send back the results!)
What a relief all around. No more confinement and no more topless mosquito nets.
One thing I know though, the next time I go south, I will be taking every single vaccine available, from yellow fever to dengue, for I will never be confined again.
So by comparison, my experience was by no means as frightening but it was a form of kidnapping and imprisonment anyway.
It started so simply, for after having a bout of fever and shivers on Friday 25th May and taking the usual home remedies and having the fever go away, to my surprise after a great day of riding to Lovers leap in St. Elizabeth from Spur Tree Hill in Manchester on Sunday, when I returned the fever suddenly reoccurred accompanied by chills.
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| View from Lovers Leap |
I mentioned that I had been in south America but had been back for over three weeks but that seems to have set off a panic as according to them Brazil has a serious malaria epidemic.That's when it was referred to a Dr. Kildere Donaldson who is supposed to be an expert in contagious diseases and he insisted that I had to be admitted for observation and the matter reported to the public health authorities for malaria had been eradicated from Jamaica and they were paranoid that it not return to the shores. I had to be admitted immediately they said so the necessary tests could be done.
Never having encountered a situation like this, I called to get legal advice but was told that my contact had no knowledge of public health law. So I called a friend had been the medical officer of health for St. Ann. His sober advice was that I go into hospital for observation and testing for if I didn't, the public health authorities could send the police for me and take me into the public hospital to be quarantined and tested.
Well that was enough to get me to go back and be admitted to Medical Associates where they put me in a private room, under a mosquito net and all! However, the net was open at the top so if any mosquitoes were around, they could have flown in and out in wild abandon, so happily, since I am terribly claustrophobic, I quickly abandoned it!!!
For two days, I was put through every possible test and I think they took away at least half of my blood and would you believe I never even had a temperature or chills for the entire time I was there .
Anyway, the hospital is not bad at all. The food good and all the staff nice but there is no place like home. So since I had absolutely no more symptoms, I was allowed to go home although the test results from the government lab were not yet not returned. (I hear those bureaucrats down there can take up to 2 weeks to send back the results!)
What a relief all around. No more confinement and no more topless mosquito nets.
One thing I know though, the next time I go south, I will be taking every single vaccine available, from yellow fever to dengue, for I will never be confined again.
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