Private sector entity abandons safe zone initiative for business sector

The private entity that months ago attempted to introduce COVID-19 safe zones throughout the business community has thrown in the towel on the initiative.

However, Dr Vidya Armogan who pioneered the project believes many more lives and livelihoods could have been saved with a more forceful approach from policymakers.

Last November, the president of the Barbados Dental Association proposed a private sector initiative requiring all frontline workers to be vaccinated and imposing strict conditions for the entry of unvaccinated patrons to places of business.

But in an interview on Monday, the orthodontist blamed the absence of a “national effort”, including from Government, for his decision to step away from the initiative.

“The Government kept saying that they were going to bring on a safe zone initiative. Even when we launched ours, it was supposed to be launched a month prior, sort of right before the Delta wave hit, and we didn’t because we kept hearing there was going to be a government initiative to do it,” Dr Armogan told Barbados TODAY.

“So, I think that is what happened in the private sector. We kept waiting to see what the government initiative was going to be and the government initiative kind of came up and it went away and then we didn’t really hear about it again, and then it kind of came with the hospitals and then we had the nurses strike.

“So, it was one of those things, I believe, that was not thought out, planned out, or executed properly on the government side, unfortunately. I would say we tried but I think that they also have other priorities,” the businessman added.

While Government initially appeared bent on implementing safe zones, the plans quickly fizzled out in December last year amid discussions with medical practitioners and backlash from the Unity Workers’ Union.

The directive, which was to be implemented from November 8, 2021, would have required unvaccinated healthcare workers to be tested weekly.

Dr Armogan charged that Government’s overall response to the COVID-19 pandemic had left a lot to be desired up to this point.

“Really and truly, for a small island we were average when you look at the number of infections, deaths and all that,” he said.

“The WHO [World Health Organization] and the northern countries cannot have the same policy as us, because we’re a small island and we can handle things a lot differently. We can shut borders, we can make sure that infection doesn’t come in here, we can deal with it when it’s in here and that’s the ability that we had that we squandered,” he added.

The orthodontist explained that when most air travel was suspended during the height of earlier waves, the country should have been preparing for a COVID-free resurgence.

“I personally don’t think we should have had schools out at all. We could have been a COVID-free society like Tonga,” said Dr Armogan.

“If you could imagine us being COVID-free, I mean like absolutely COVID-free like New Zealand, Australia or whatever, where we actually made sure anybody entering Barbados actually went through a strict quarantine and follow-up protocol with monitoring after they came out of quarantine, we could have controlled COVID in Barbados.

“So, yes, you would have created a different kind of tourism where people that had the means – the same Welcome Stamp people and everybody else – would have come here, they would have been able to go to church, go to restaurants, go to malls, go to the cinemas without a mask during the height of a pandemic and you would have opened up a different segment. All the villas would have been opened up, all the hotels would’ve been filled with people if they came, quarantined properly, and then re-joined our society,” he lamented.

The medical practitioner said the focus must now switch from the creation of safe zones to overcoming the surging outbreak of the Omicron variant and reopening the country. kareemsmith@barbadostoday.bb