Lengthy confinement affects state of mind

THE EDITOR: I have read where Minister of Health Terrence Deyalsingh has instituted a tighter “lockdown” of hardware stores, restricting their opening times to Monday, Thursday and Saturday from 8 am to noon.

I do not have a problem with the Government’s attempt to collar the covid19 pandemic and to flatten the curve. What I do have a problem with is the reasons advanced by the goodly minister about someone going out to purchase paint and another, a barbecue pit.

The minister seems to have a penchant for highlighting the negatives and refuses to see the positive actions of the majority of our citizens.

He recently highlighted someone stopped by the police was going to sell a dog, not realising that the backup of vehicles that we witnessed on Friday last was an “artificial jam” created by the Commissioner of Police and his men. This led to the minister arriving at a false conclusion – that citizens are by and large still not staying at home.

The commissioner is yet to provide figures indicating the percentage of drivers who were stopped and who were going nowhere.

This latest move by the minister to reduce the hardware stores’ opening to three half-days is going to create a bottleneck just like what the police did, creating long lines at the hardware stores which then challenge our social distancing efforts.

The minister would then complain that he is still seeing long lines at the hardwares, not realising the policy he instituted was the cause.

The closure of some banks in certain areas has caused long lines at other branches so that customers are now facing longer lines at banks further from their homes. Simply put, restricting the movement of water usually causes a flood. It is now taking as much as three hours in long lines to complete transactions.

The covid19 figures seem to suggest that citizens are doing what’s right and are trying to deal with their confinement.

Recent studies by psychiatrists and psychologists have shown that any kind of confinement for any length of time can alter the state of mind of human beings and in this period of confinement they recommend that one should not stay in one’s house all day watching depressing news around the world about covid19. This can affect a person’s mentally.

They advise that people plan their day the night before and suggest that a new hobby should be found: cooking, gardening, art. Get out your paint brushes and paint; paint a fence, front gate or window frames.

In a previous briefing the Minister of Finance suggested that since the hotel industry is suspended now is a suitable time to renovate guest houses and hotels, paint walls and improve appearances.

I therefore conclude that the restrictions handed down by Deyalsingh run counter to the suggestions given by the Finance Minister and that the Health Minister has not taken on board the advice of experts in the field of psychiatry and psychology on how humans are to deal with confinement.

BRENT THOMPSON

via e-mail