The bubble has burst

TOMORROW marks two weeks since the last covid19 update from the Prime Minister.

In October, Dr Rowley felt comfortable enough to reopen beaches and allow a few other relaxations.

Since then, however, the world has changed.

In Europe, France, Germany and England have returned to lockdown. Italy has gone on red alert. Deaths on the continent have doubled. Hospitals in Belgium’s capital, Brussels, reached maximum capacity on Monday.

Over in the US, hopes of that country returning its focus to fighting the virus after a bitter election have been dashed by a narrow result that threatens to prolong the country’s turmoil.

The substantial support received by incumbent president Donald Trump suggests many there do not view covid19 as seriously as health officials would like. The offshoot was perhaps the fact that the US yesterday reported more than 100,000 new cases – the highest in a single day.

Closer to home, while some Caribbean countries have reopened, the efforts by Caricom to apply universal standards across the region have stalled.

“The Caricom bubble has burst,” declared Grenada’s Health Minister Nickolas Steele in the Grenada parliament last week. That country is now applying its own quarantine rules.

Hours earlier, Caricom leaders, including Dr Rowley, met virtually, having already met in emergency sessions in May, August and September. Despite praise from a special guest, UN Secretary General António Guterres, for their collective response to covid19, they could not resolve all the barriers to harmonisation.

So regional chief medical officers have been sent back to the drawing board to “refine the common technical standards for the Caricom Travel Bubble.”

The Health Minister and public health officials have already warned recently that with repatriation flights have come imported cases of the virus. That numbers are rising so alarmingly in so many parts of the world should give pause to those calling ever more loudly for this country’s borders to be reopened as other restrictions are lifted.

That the situation is drastically different from what it was a few weeks ago when Dr Rowley last took the podium is also brought home by the fact that even the head of the World Health Organization (WHO), Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, this week had to go into self-quarantine after someone near him tested positive.

Notwithstanding the coming advent of festive commemorations such as Divali and Christmas, and notwithstanding concerns about a general “covid fatigue” setting in, the Prime Minister has little choice but to take heed of the dramatic warnings all around.

Since August, he has himself warned a second lockdown would be dire.

Dr Rowley may not wish to reverse course by tightening measures once again. But at the very least he must clearly and unequivocally dial back any expectation the population might have of an immediate reprieve.

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"The bubble has burst"

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