A po­lice of­fi­cer work­ing with­in the con­fines of Par­lia­ment has test­ed pos­i­tive for COVID-19.

The news came from Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley dur­ing yes­ter­day’s press con­fer­ence up­dat­ing the coun­try on Gov­ern­ment’s COVID-19 mea­sures at the Diplo­mat­ic Cen­tre, St Ann’s.

Re­porters had asked Row­ley if there was any truth to a re­port that an of­fi­cer as­signed to Par­lia­ment had test­ed pos­i­tive for COVID-19, in­for­ma­tion which has re­cent­ly been cir­cu­lat­ing in a What­sapp group chat.

The PM ad­mit­ted that a po­lice­man from Par­lia­ment’s se­cu­ri­ty “has been con­firmed as one of our can­di­dates. Where he would have con­tract­ed it, I have no in­for­ma­tion.”

He made it clear that it was a “staff mem­ber not a Par­lia­men­tar­i­an” and that cit­i­zens should not over-analyse the sit­u­a­tion since the of­fi­cer was a mem­ber of the na­tion­al com­mu­ni­ty.

“The en­tire na­tion­al com­mu­ni­ty is ex­posed. And that is why it is so un­ac­cept­able that per­sons who be­lieve they are healthy and free could be tak­ing in­hu­mane ac­tions against per­sons who may be high lev­el or low-lev­el guys... or low-risk pa­tients that some­how you could take ac­tion against them in preser­va­tion of your own state.”

He said every­one was at risk of con­tract­ing the virus. The PM added that in the cur­rent sce­nario, Row­ley it was ei­ther we sink or swim to­geth­er in this pan­dem­ic.

Ques­tioned if there will be a sit­ting of Par­lia­ment soon, Row­ley said no.

“We don’t an­tic­i­pate a sit­ting of Par­lia­ment very soon but I don’t know what may hap­pen that may cause the Par­lia­ment to meet in emer­gency. But as of now, we don’t have that plan.”

He said his Gov­ern­ment was al­so aim­ing not to have week­ly round ta­ble Cab­i­net meet­ings as they usu­al­ly do at the Diplo­mat­ic Cen­tre.

“We are work­ing on a dif­fer­ent arrange­ment where the Cab­i­net will func­tion on a dif­fer­ent arrange­ment in the very near fu­ture.”