As Barbados continues to grapple with trying to halt the spread of the deadly COVID-19 virus, the Assistant Dean of an emerging offshore medical school here has slammed the Government for “failing to protect” the island’s borders immediately after the first cases were identified in mid-March.
Patricia Inniss, a biochemist and former head of the Barbados Water Authority’s (BWA) Wastewater Division today accused the Government of dropping the ball when it kept allowing people to enter the country, particularly non-residents.
Inniss, who preferred not to name her employer at this stage, is adamant that while the borders needed to be kept open for trade, only persons who live here should have been allowed in and all of them should have been quarantined.
“When you have a war, you put your soldiers at the frontline early to protect your borders. That is the first thing you do in a war. You protect your borders,” said the Barbadian scientist.
According to her those seeking entry should have been questioned along the lines of ‘do you have to come here, sir. What are you coming here for?’ and should have been sent back on their way.
“That was the first thing…to reduce those persons coming to Barbados. Nobody should have been coming into Barbados since March,” Inniss told Barbados TODAY.
She also contended that everybody should have been screened and those with return tickets placed on the next flight out.
“Everybody coming in should have had a quarantine regime. If it means bringing all your health care workers, volunteers, whatever. That would have been a hard thing, but the dramatic approach should have been at our borders. Keep it out of the country,” Inniss insisted in light of six deaths and 80 confirmed COVID-19 cases in Barbados so far.
She said it was now too late for the Government to be trying to implement such a measure considering that the ball had already been dropped.
She also questioned the Government’s pronouncements that aggressive contact tracing is being conducted.
“Don’t tell me it is aggressive contact tracing and then a person who came into Barbados who was living with somebody and that person was tested positive and nobody tested the family members who were there with her. Furthermore, the family member continued happily along their business,” she declared.
“What, you didn’t have the equipment? You didn’t have the swabs? Maybe that is the situation, but then don’t come on tv and say ‘we are doing an excellent job.’ No. The ball was dropped,” said the water quality consultant.
“So how do we recover from that now? To recover from it, is not a case of a lot of politicians and a lot of people, all well-meaning, talking, talking, talking administrative in your ears. We don’t want administrative. We need to know what is going on. The frontliners and the technical persons and the scientists, those are the persons to tell people, this is where we at, this is what happened, this is what we are doing in simple terms. That is not happening,” Inniss stated.
She also condemned those who scoffed at wearing of cloth masks.
“The advocacy should be to wear a mask and if you only have a cloth mask, it is better than nothing. A simple piece of cloth that you put on your face, does not provide the level of protection that you want…that is, a breathable surface and a water repellant surface on the outside,” Inniss suggested.
She however noted that one benefit of any mask is that people are not talking “all over the place” and spewing saliva everywhere. emmanueljoseph@barbadostoday.bb
