Dr Beaubrun said during an Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) simulcast on Sunday, September 26, 2021, "We are small islands with limited resources, our health care services are already overburdened, our health care workers are already overworked, our economies are unstable, people's livelihoods are still in limbo and we can't take much more, and I will tell you, we are not good.

"The longer we stay in curfews and lockdowns and isolated, we face another issue that we are not looking at, it is a pandemic of mental ill-health! Because people are stressed and anxious and worried and these things are exacerbating our patients with chronic diseases," she stated.

Dr Tanya D. Beaubrun said persons should become vaccinated, boost their immune systems, eat the right foods, exercise and follow the government protocols.

Get vaccinated & boost immune system- Dr Beaubrun

Meanwhile, Dr Beaubrun said persons should become vaccinated, boost their immune systems, eat the right foods, exercise and follow the government protocols.

She said the notion of being young and healthy is not enough to beat the virus.

"Some of the patients who were critically ill were some of the patients I thought were actually healthy. So those patients of mine who got COVID-19 and had to be hospitalised or were critically ill were those that I thought were in pretty good shape, so I don't think we have the luxury of saying things like 'I am a healthy young person". We just don't know, because of how the virus attacks our every cell in every critical area of the body, the lung, the brain, the heart, you don't know at which point your body is going to give way," she said.

The simulcast was streamed on the VI's Government social media page and was entitled: COVID-19 Vaccines: A dose of the facts.

There were other speakers who encouraged persons to become inoculated to give themselves a fighting chance against the COVID-19. They were Antigua's Chief Medical Officer (CMO) Dr Rhonda Sealey- Thomas; Grenada's CMO, Dr Shawn Charles and Head of the Health Promotions in Dominica, Nurse Mignon Rolle-Shillingford.