Raphael John-Lall

raphael.lall@guardian.co.tt

Med­ical pro­fes­sion­als have all agreed that the Gov­ern­ment has made the best de­ci­sion by re­mov­ing most of the pan­dem­ic-re­lat­ed re­stric­tions.

Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley made these an­nounce­ments at a press con­fer­ence yes­ter­day at the Diplo­mat­ic Cen­tre, St Ann’s.

Giv­en the re­duc­tion of the COVID-19 re­lat­ed cas­es and deaths, he an­nounced a roll­back in some of the re­stric­tions which in­clude the re­moval of safe zones, re­stric­tions of beach ac­tiv­i­ties will be lift­ed, there will no longer be lim­its on the size of pub­lic gath­er­ings, and peo­ple en­ter­ing the coun­try all they need is an anti­gen test.

How­ev­er, he not­ed that he does not have a crys­tal ball and does not know what the fu­ture holds with re­gard to the virus and urged cit­i­zens to con­tin­ue to take per­son­al re­spon­si­bil­i­ty for their health.

Pres­i­dent of the T&T Reg­is­tered Nurs­es As­so­ci­a­tion Idi Stu­art told the Sun­day Guardian that they are sat­is­fied by the Gov­ern­ment’s lat­est move.

“We are in agree­ment with the re­moval of those re­stric­tions. Those re­stric­tions are for a lim­it­ed pe­ri­od of time as it re­stricts peo­ple’s civ­il lib­er­ties. With the num­bers that we are see­ing with­in the COVID fa­cil­i­ties, it is more than enough time to re­move the re­stric­tions. When you keep these re­stric­tions for an in­or­di­nate pe­ri­od, peo­ple be­gin to get weary and they be­gin to flout it and the mere fact of hav­ing it be­gins to lose its flavour. If it has to be re­placed be­cause of a fu­ture spike then so be it, but dur­ing these low pe­ri­ods of hos­pi­tal­iza­tions then it is a good move.”

Stu­art added that the Gov­ern­ment should now fo­cus on pri­ma­ry health care for the pop­u­la­tion as many of the peo­ple who did con­tract the COVID virus were suf­fer­ing from di­a­betes and obe­si­ty.

“Like the Prime Min­is­ter we do not have a crys­tal ball, how­ev­er we warn the pop­u­la­tion to fo­cus on pre­vent­ing them­selves from falling in those cat­e­gories. There would be oth­er in­fec­tions in the fu­ture un­re­lat­ed to COVID and it is those cat­e­gories of cit­i­zens whose im­mune sys­tems would be com­pro­mised. This is an op­por­tune time for all of us as cit­i­zens to start seek­ing bet­ter health prac­tices like eat­ing bet­ter and ex­er­cise. This is the les­son that was lost up­on the pop­u­la­tion last two years.”

For­mer Health Min­is­ter Dr Fuad Khan told the Sun­day Guardian that the Gov­ern­ment should have lift­ed the re­stric­tions much ear­li­er.

“In fact, the Prime Min­is­ter should have re­moved every sin­gle thing. But peo­ple still have to con­tend with the fool­ish­ness in the air­port. I came in the oth­er night and it is rub­bish that peo­ple are sub­ject­ed to. Peo­ple still have to do an anti­gen test. Many oth­er coun­tries across the world have re­moved these re­stric­tions.”

Khan al­so said that the COVID-19 is here to stay and it should be treat­ed as a “com­mon cold” and noth­ing more.

“When peo­ple get sick they should take their med­ica­tion like a nor­mal cold.”

He warned that the eco­nom­ic sit­u­a­tion glob­al­ly and in T&T is get­ting worse and hav­ing re­stric­tions on lo­cal busi­ness­es will not help.

“There will be food short­ages and an in­crease in food prices. The biggest los­er in all of this is the de­struc­tion of the econ­o­my.”

CLICK FOR MORE NEWS