Second look at transport needed

THE EDITOR: Vehicles have become the perfect vessel by which to transmit covid19. In a vehicle, you are forced to be in close proximity with others.

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

However, rather than wait for the 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.

No solution is off the table. Among the measures is a ban on leaving home except for reasons of work, health and emergency.

Before we reach the stage where we have to quarantine our citizens, we need to limit our transportation system. I suggest there must not be more than two people in a vehicle including the driver. In other words, we are preaching about not congregating, yet still we have people travelling by buses and maxi taxis and even taxis. Even PH cars 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.

Basically, we have the formula, we just need have it enforced. Do not congregate! Remember, do not congregate! If we could shut down churches, 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. The time to act is now and before we become too paranoid, let us nip it in the bud and limit the number of people per vehicle. Trust me, we will all get by.

TERRENCE KALLOO

Businessman