Dear Editor,
The irresponsible behaviour of the current Administration with regard to the COVID pandemic is recognized not only among Guyanese but by the PAHO officials who spoke of the surging cases of the virus within Guyana. One month ago, the PAHO chief urged countries in the Americas to adopt strict measures such as extending curfews, issuing stay at home orders and tightening restrictions but Guyana has yet to comply. Guyana has currently exceeded 16,000 reported positive cases of the COVID virus and has a reported number of 359 deaths which is a high death toll having regard to our population. During the month of April, a total of 66 persons have died from this deadly virus and there are 60 reported deaths for this month thus far with 8 deaths within the past 48 hours.
The Government of Guyana continues in its callous disregard of instituting measures to protect its people and instead further endangers the lives of the Guyanese people by reopening casinos, having no reasonable curfew, having restaurants, bars, and salons, places of worship, creeks and recreational areas all open. One would have thought that a cue might have been taken from the loss of lives and situation currently in Trinidad and Tobago where a state of emergency was recently declared and Prime Minister Rowley closed all of the bars, restaurants, nightclubs, and beaches and also imposed a strict curfew. It is wholly unacceptable that this Govern-ment has all of these places open and has openly declared its refusal to adjust the curfew or to impose a lockdown. How then can the Government reconcile their statements with having all places of business and entertainment open? The Government needs to stop catering to the needs of the business owners and to address the safety and lives of the Guyanese people.
The Government of Guyana continues to endanger the lives of Guyanese by its public outreach programmes promoting its GOAL (Guyana Online Academy of Learning) Scholarships. It is ironic that this is an online programme and the Government has been recruiting persons across the country by massive outreaches in persons with crowds of persons mingling thereby putting themselves at risk of contracting the virus. Such irresponsible actions by the Government which selects different ministers for each outreach must be condemned. The Government seems to be hinging all of its efforts on vaccine availability. Vaccines are the best way to achieve herd immunity but there must be some recognition that there is a lot of vaccine reluctance by persons in Guyana. There must be measures to protect the people in the interim rather than proudly referring to a vaccination campaign. Those at the helm of the administration seem to have indoctrinated the other Ministers who all seem to be towing the party line of vaccination without care or consideration for the fact that persons are dying in the interim due to no restrictions. In fact one Minister on her Facebook page went as far as to arrogantly state: “The only option the world has to survive is to take the vaccine! Period!!!!” I beg to differ Minister. The world needs good leaders who can protect the people by having measures in place to help to curtail the spread of the virus especially when vaccines are not being taken by most of the population. It is akin to Nero sitting back and fiddling while Rome burns. The Government is sitting back while persons are dying but are waiting on a vaccination campaign to be successful. The PAHO head has stated that vaccines alone are not sufficient to stop the virus but have to be in conjunction with restrictions and public health measures. If the people of Guyana are not adhering to the public health measures then the onus is upon the Govern-ment to impose social restrictions and measures to curtail the spread. Guyana does not have the resources and proper health care to deal with a full-blown pandemic. As cases escalate, there will be no beds available for patients at ICU facilities in Guyana. The doctors who head these units have issued dire warnings as to the effect of the system becoming overwhelmed and inundated with cases. The time to act is now and to take measures to ensure that we do not reach to that grim point.
I refer to the letter of Nick Harewood to this newspaper on May 24, 2021 in which he showed the advantages of having a properly managed lockdown to give the breathing space and pause so that we can better implement measures and take steps to keep the people of Guyana safe. The editorials and letters in the press have referred to this “unhearing” Government.
Sincerely,
Stephanie Isaacs