Monitoring unit head says closing businesses would put stress on everyone

The Delta variant can have catastrophic effects if Barbadians do not follow the necessary protocols says Head of the COVID-19 Monitoring Unit Ronald Chapman.

Speaking on popular radio call-in programme Down To Brass Tacks, Chapman warned that the more contagious variant had the potential to infect thousands.

“It is not a comment that health professionals feel any comfort in saying but if we are not careful this new outbreak in Delta is going to be the game-changer for a lot of the attitudes and behaviours in Barbadians because in a very short space of time if we are not careful, and if we don’t practice what we are supposed to be practicing, almost everybody in Barbados or everybody in Barbados will know someone who would have had COVID-19.

“I’ve always said that results don’t lie. You can argue with facts, you can argue with all sorts of things, but you can’t argue with results and our behaviour is going to bring about a number of results which we are hoping and praying do not materialize and those are the sobering facts of this Delta outbreak that we are seeing,” Chapman stated.

He explained that in light of the Delta outbreak, health authorities were forced to make some changes to the directives.

However, he said even though bars and churches were deemed high-risk spots, the decision was taken not to close them in order to “balance lives and livelihoods”.

“What we are looking at trying to do is how can we allow businesses to survive and still allow people not to get COVID. It’s a balance between life and livelihoods and that’s the constant balance we have to be fighting. So stipulations will be put on bars but we’re not trying to close them down and it’s the same thing with churches and most other businesses. We are not trying to close businesses down because once you close businesses down then it puts stress on the employer, it puts stress on the employees, as well as the suppliers, as well as the patrons. It has a knock-on effect,” Chapman maintained.

“So what we are trying to do is to work with each and every business to a point where we can have them open but still reduce the level of risks.”

However, Chapman revealed that beaches were once again a place of concern.

He said the monitoring unit was aware of persons congregating on beaches and had also received pictures of this worrying behaviour.

“We know that in the early days of the pandemic we would have had issues with beaches and we would have employed a number of persons, these persons were beach monitors. They were trained and placed on the beaches to remind people gently of the protocols and to guide them in the right direction where necessary.

“I know that over the last weekend I received a number of pictures of persons at the beach, especially Browne’s Beach, congregating…I would have seen the pictures over the last week or so but it may have been going on for a bit longer, but we know there are some issues and we will be addressing those issues at the beach,” Chapman assured.
(randybennett@barbadostoday.bb)