BHTA ramping up efforts to encourage vaccination among membership

Only about 40 per cent of the Barbados Hotel and Tourism Association (BHTA) membership has opted to take the COVID-19 vaccine and the organisation will be launching a major education campaign to get more to take the jab, says Chief Executive Officer Senator Rudy Grant.

Pointing out that there would be no forced vaccination of tourism sector workers given the recent announcement by Government, Grant told the BHTA’s third quarterly general meeting that an educational and sensitisation campaign was necessary.

He said a committee had been established drawn from representatives of the Ministry of Tourism and International Transport, the Ministry of Labour and Social Partnership Relations, the Barbados Tourism Marketing Inc. and the Barbados Workers’ Union.

“We are expecting that we will have some support as well from the Ministry of Health and Wellness, and we will be rolling out that programme very soon where we will be visiting hotels or bringing hotel employees within the same catchment area trying to communicate with them and educate persons with respect to the importance of taking the vaccine,” said Grant.

He said some members were reporting very good take-up of COVID-19 vaccination at their facilities, ranging from between 70 per cent to 90 per cent, with one hotel property reporting a 100 per cent vaccination rate.

“One of the things we recognise there is that in those cases there was continuous dialogue that took place with members of staff and that is why we think it is important as well, as we seek to encourage more persons to take the vaccine, that there is continuous engagement,” he said.

“We are still concerned with respect to the overall level of vaccination, which our preliminary data shows is in excess of 40 per cent. Of course, that vaccination rate is still very low and we still have to get that up to a more welcoming amount and one that is closely related to what is termed herd immunity,” he added.

Pointing to the data which showed that about 81 per cent of people in isolation up to Monday, September 6 were unvaccinated and the continued high COVID-19 positive rates, Grant said the situation was somewhat worrying, as he recalled events leading up to tighter measures at the start of this year as a result of a surge at the end of 2020.

“I think that underscores the point of the importance of vaccination,” he said.

“The concern for us is that we have to make sure that we can bring this particular situation, where we are seeing increasing positive cases and an increasing transmission rate, under control. This is happening in an environment where the expectation is that we will see continued growth in tourism business,” he said.

Grant said the BHTA, which has donated several items to the Harrison’s Point Medical Isolation Facility in the past, would again be making a donation of several items as well as facilitating “some beautification” of the location.

He also reported that the occupancy level in local accommodation for the month of July was about 44 per cent, double what had been projected earlier in the year.

The tourism boss said he was pleased that airlift will continue to increase as the winter period approaches, which would continue to result in increased occupancy levels.

“We do have some hotels at this time that are reporting significant occupancies – occupancies of 70, 80 and 90 per cent – and I do have to say that there are some days that you find it very difficult to get a room in certain hotels. While the overall occupancy is lower than that, it signals to us that business is coming back. We expect by October all BHTA hotels will be operational,” he said.

Only three BHTA hotel members are yet to go back into operation. (MM)