‘Write a COVID-19 playbook so the show can go on’ – NCF official

Entertainers and promoters have been advised to create a COVID-19 protocol playbook that could be used as basic health rules to be followed for future events when nightlife is allowed to reopen later this year.

Senior Business Development Officer at the National Cultural Foundation (NCF), Andre Hoyte, made the suggestion during Thursday’s online panel discussion on the state of the entertainment industry.

Noting that the industry been struggling for some time after COVID-19 restrictions were implemented since the start of the year, Hoyte said it is in the best interest of local creatives to create a playbook on how they themselves plan to keep future events safe as possible during the pandemic, which would, in turn, give the present administration a level of confidence on the readiness of the industry to follow COVID-19 protocols and health advice.

The NCF official said: “I think you as an association, you then have to think about what is going to be in your protocol handbook. How will you operate in terms of your events, have you identified specific spaces and size venues that you think can work based on what may be the requirement for distancing. How do you deal with things like how do you move in and out of that space, what technology will you bring to areas such as catering services for production.

Performers, tech crews, and members of the public.

“What is the ratio of digital versus physical that you are going to be having in your business model? Are you now going to be moving into an 80 per cent video visual platform, versus a 20 per cent physical in space?”

Hoyte also suggested that entertainment associations seek to include COVID-19 testing drives in their event planning to help bolster both the Government’s and attendees’ confidence in the safety of public events.

“In your drive as event promoters leading up to events, one of the things that you might actually want to say to the Ministry of Health, is that as part of our promotion we will have testing drives,” Hoyte told the online forum. “This may be something that the association may want to work on in the next three to four months as you are preparing to come out of this.

“Where you use your association that is responsible for event production, producing events and hosting events, to increase or to raise that testing and vaccine drive, but as an agency, as a group, as a collective that represents over 300 or 400 persons.”

Dr. Adanna Grandison, vice president of the Barbados Association of Medical Practitioners (BAMP), also supported Hoyte’s suggestion. She stressed that the current level of testing being done was not at a safe level for larger-scale public events to begin again, with health officials also wanting to avoid the situation of delayed PCR test results that occurred earlier on in the pandemic.

She said: “[BAMP] has been meeting with the Ministry of Health really to try to get their testing protocols and efficacy of the lab and the automation of the lab to be increased. So that we do not have that same challenge again.

“We know that there is a component of the lab that is partially automated, and certainly with the advent of the Rapid PCR tests, we are hopeful that as we try to move towards, not just for entertainment, but if we reopen our ports of entry, that we can certainly facilitate everyone.

I think that is the goal of everyone, but as we speak right now, we are not there yet.”

Dr. Grandison also encouraged entertainers and promoters to use their reach to encourage followers to not only get tested when required but also to keep following the health protocols.

“Entertainers have social capital like no one else,” the BAMP executive said. “They have reach like no one else and it’s a perfect opportunity to get out there and to encourage persons to test so that we can see if we are really up to par and if we can really handle increased testing numbers going to the lab before we can decide that we are going to reopen.”
(SB)