Nguyen says technology will be key in fight against coronavirus

The COVID-19 pandemic has cast a shadow over our everyday life for most of 2020, and sadly it seems like it will be a while before we see a significant silver lining. As we approach the end of the year with surges in coronavirus-positive cases and a hospital resorting to putting patients in the gift shop or in tents, it's important to reflect on how we've been handling this virus so far.

Chairman of the Governor's Physicians Advisory Group Dr. Hoa Ngyuen told KUAM News, "It's overwhelming for any agency - including Public Health - to handle it. And they are adjusting, trying, we're still overwhelmed."

Dr. Ngyuen says that technology will be key in controlling the spread of the virus moving forward, adding, "We're still pushing Public Health and to get into digital platforms rather than everything manual. So, that way, everything can happen faster. The isolation, the initial contact tracing, still kind of lag behind quite a bit and that's something that we'll have to improve a lot as we go further into this pandemic, until the vaccine comes. So, there's a lot of room for improvement.

"If we don't do that soon, we will get way, way behind."

Especially in the age of technology, skepticism and fear of misused personal information leave many people hesitant to voluntarily participate in implementation of COVID related Apps. But Dr. Ngyuen says, they will work - if people actually use it.

"The Sara Alert and The COVID Guam Alert apps, are helping on the symptom monitoring, okay, and helping on the contact tracing, but especially with Guam COVID App, you have to have a certain amount of people on Guam that download before it can work effectively," he said.

While the apps do their jobs at symptom monitoring and contact tracing, Dr. Ngyuen says that the pace at which a positive test result can be informed to isolate and how fast contact tracing can begin, is where the switch to digital will make the difference. But at the end of the day, the most the Physicians Advisory Group can do?

"We will continue to push it, through the meetings, continue to push to the media, make sure that we have our voice heard. And again, it's advice that we give and we cannot make it happen though. It's up to the powers that be, to make it happen and follow our advice," shared Nguyen.