Limit one passenger per vehicle to combat covid19

THE EDITOR: Kudos to the Government and its team for taking the proverbial “bull by the horn” in such a serious and effective manner.

However, rather than wait for the covid virus to spread, we must learn from those who were affected and what they did. Italy at present is mulling even tighter restrictions on daily life.

To date, no Western Government has taken such significant measures. Amongst the measures is a ban on leaving home except for reasons of work, health and emergency.

“Only lockdown can stop the virus, as it happened in China and South Korea.” Police officers “man” the streets to ensure there are no transgressors.

Before we reach the stage where we have to quarantine our citizens, we need to limit our transportation system. My suggestion is that there must not be more than two people in a vehicle including the driver. In other words, we are preaching about not congregating, but yet still we have people travelling by buses and maxi taxis and even taxis. Even our private vehicles are full of passengers.

Encourage our citizens to stay at home and even when they are at home, they should practise social distancing.

I know people will say this is crazy, but it will allow businesses to continue on a smaller scale and we will all have access to groceries, pharmacies, hardwares, banks, markets etc. Business owners must carry some of the burden and only have essential staff at work who do not have to travel en masse. In other words, we would have access to our essential needs and there would be no need for draconian action.

Additionally, our ministries and government agencies seem to be running at half mast. We need to reduce these agencies to only essential services. Basically, we have the formula, we just need have it enforced. Do not congregate! Remember, do not congregate! If we could “shut down” our religious institutions, why can’t we shut down other places?

As we have seen by some of the indifferent attitude being displayed by some of our citizens, we cannot depend on them to voluntarily take us out of this predicament. Information from the press shows people having a good time in Caura, liming on the beaches “liming fearlessly” and getting home at all costs. The time to act is now and before we become too paranoid, let us “nip it in the bud” and limit the amount of people per vehicle. Trust me, we will all get by.

Sarah Boschiroli psychologist and psychotherapist from Lombardy, Italy said “The other day I realised that the panel on which funeral notices are hung is no longer enough. Now they’re also on the one normally used for advertisements. This is a very hard blow on a cognitive level.”

I leave it to the experts to take the next step before it is too late.

Terrence Kalloo

businessman

via e-mail