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Covid Paralysis vs Covid Management

Submitted by Richard Petko The past two weeks has seen a national pause and a furtherance of the pause. What are the actual goals of the pause? What are the goalposts for re-opening? What are the goals for tourism? These are all valid questions and I think they should be asked and answered. Before answering…

Submitted by Richard Petko

The past two weeks has seen a national pause and a furtherance of the pause. What are the actual goals of the pause? What are the goalposts for re-opening? What are the goals for tourism? These are all valid questions and I think they should be asked and answered. Before answering it is pertinent to see what other Caribbean jurisdictions which are considered as world class as Barbados are doing.

Barbados Population 285,000

  • Cases daily 30-60
  • Masks – everywhere
  • Curfew – 7pm to 6am
  • Schools – closed
  • Economy – mostly shut down, supermarkets open M-F 8-4
  • Activity – Beaches and parks 6-9am
  • Tourism – PCR test to enter, antigen test at airport, 5 day hotel room quarantine, test followup
  • Airlift International – 3-5 flights per day
  • Positive Covid on Island – Residents & Tourists sent to government isolation facility for indefinite period of time no matter what their symptoms

Costa Rica Population 5 million

  • Cases daily 300-450
  • Masks – indoors
  • Curfew – None
  • Schools – Open
  • Economy – Open – everything open
  • Activity – everything open
  • Tourism – NO PCR test required of anyone
  • Airlift International – 20-23 daily flights
  • Positive test In Country – isolate at home, only sick people go to hospital

Aruba Population 105,000

  • Cases daily 20-50
  • Masks – indoors
  • Curfew – 11pm
  • Schools – Open
  • Economy – Open – everything open
  • Activity – Everything open
  • Tourism – PCR test required 72 hours old
  • Airlift International – 24-30 daily flights
  • Positive Test in Island – Tourist and Locals isolate at home, only sick people go to hospital

I think it is quite evident to see that in Costa Rica and Aruba we have governments that are managing Covid and the economy. They are not banning tourism and have come to the realization that Covid is an endemic respiratory virus that you should not be destroying your economy over. The per capita case numbers are the same in all 3 countries. It is the response that is clearly different.

It is probably shocking for many to see that you can fly to Costa Rica without a PCR test, that everything is open and somehow the country has not had a medical or economic collapse.

It is my opinion that this government is acting in an irrational panic rather than managing the issue. The country always praises its robust health care system, which has been bolstered by the arrival of 120 Cuban doctors and nurses. Harrison’s Point offers a large enough facility to house all the truly sick people from infection. I feel one of the biggest mistakes is taking every single sars-cov2 positive person into isolation. The data from studies in China and by the WHO now clearly show asymptomatic transmission of Covid is miniscule (roughly 3%). Needlessly putting an asymptomatic 37-year-old into isolation simply strains the resources of the facility. Not to mention the fact people are being taken away definitely makes them hesitant to go for tests or to share health information with others.

Barbados is better than this peripatetic response seen these past 2 weeks. Sars-Cov2 is here and is going nowhere. Locking up people in their houses until February 28th is not going to change anything.

It is time to do the following.

  • Open up the entire economy immediately
  • Open up all the schools to in-person teaching – this sacrifice of our children’s education over a respiratory virus will be the shame that will be focused upon in the history books
  • Open up tourism – Go with a 72 hour old PCR test on arrival. This is truly not needed as Covid is here and endemic, but for a couple of months it will appease a portion of the population. However, the point is there is no need to worry if 1 of 100 tourists arrives here with Covid when 5-10% of Bajans are testing positive for it.
  • Isolate only sick covid patients and focus health on them
  • Continue with a rapid rollout of the vaccination program, ensure enough vaccines arrive by the end of March for everyone who wants one to receive one.
  • Start a public campaign to truly educate people about the disease and the management plan
  • Encourage mask use indoors only – outdoor mask use is nonsense and everyone knows it, by dictating such a policy it discourages people to listen to the valid pronouncements of public health authorities
  • Stop this nonsense of stores and businesses testing their entire staff if someone tests positive for sars-cov2. If a supermarket in Florida has a positive test, they don’t shut down the market and test the 200 employees. It makes absolutely no scientific sense and actually has been discouraged by the covid task force. It should be mandated that it should not be done. This would be simple by not allowing the Beth Dos Santos Lab to process any tests from such establishments.

The above are simple and will lead Barbados out of this COVID situation much faster and more robust than any national pause.

218 responses to “Covid Paralysis vs Covid Management”

  1. Tron Avatar
    Tron

    Anyone who wears a gas mask with an NBC filter or a half mask with filters against chemical exposure cannot contract COVID19. If our entire population wore such masks, our island would be COVID19-free from one second to the next.

    We should therefore ask ourselves first and foremost in the case of COVID19 patients why people are so negligent in contracting the disease. I exclude from this accusation all bedridden people in nursing homes and hospitals.

  2. Dirt Farmer Avatar
    Dirt Farmer

    ● / NEWS & COMMENT
    Roadmap out of lockdown: What’s the picture for hospitality?

    Scene Tiffin Box Team Eating
    LUCY TOMLINSON
    22 February 2021
    When can I go to the pub again and who with?

    PRIME Minister Boris Johnson addressed Parliament at 3:30 pm today (February 22) to confirm details of the Government’s plan to ease lockdown restrictions across England.

    Despite the slogan ‘data not dates’, dates were a key element of the announcement and data was thin on the ground.

    The plan followed a calendar structure with each date given as ‘no earlier than’ in each case. This is in case new variants change the course of the disease or make the vaccine less effective.

    There is a five-week gap between each stage: four weeks to collect data and one to collate the results and give businesses a week to prepare. All changes will affect the whole of the UK – there will be no return to the tier system.

    Outdoor hospitality to open in mid-April

    With Step 1 focusing on schools and limited outdoor mixing, the first reopening phase for bars, pubs and restaurants is during Step 2′. This stage is slated to come in ‘no earlier than’ April 12 – ideally placed for the start of the Easter holidays.

    Outdoor hospitality (which the headlines have referred to as ‘beer gardens’ for the last few weeks, though of course constitutes much more than that) can resume, as well children’s activities, weddings (15 people) and funerals (30 people), outdoor attractions, theme parks and all retail – all of which directly or indirectly bear on hospitality.

    The good news for pubs with outdoor space is that there will be no ‘substantial meal’ rule for alcohol consumption but it will be table service only.

    Indoor leisure such as gyms, libraries and community centres will also reopen but no mixing will be allowed here. Mr Johnson took the opportunity to make a self-deprecating comment about personal services such as hairdressers reopening at this time also.

    So-called ‘pilot events’ will begin in this phase also which is the tentative testing out of possibilities for larger events.
    Eating in back on the menu from mid-May

    All the people, so many people: You’ll be able to hang out in parks and gardens with your 30 closest pals from May 17th at the earliest. Indoors, the rule of six will return but there’s room for more at the table if they’re from only two households.

    This step is really the one for hospitality when all those venues not blessed with the luxury of outdoor dining and drinking space can welcome people through the doors again. The same rules for indoor numbers above will apply.

  3. Donna Avatar
    Donna

    Tiger was probably under the influence of something. Poor fellow had identity problems. The fact that he only went for droopy ass white women and plenty of them is all the evidence you need for that diagnosis.

    He has a hole in his soul that he tried to fill with sex with white women. Then the outraged white media found out, and, angry that he was fooping all their women (as usual) turned on him and labelled him a beast. They were also angry deep down inside that yet again, an inferior black man was beating the superior white man at his own special game that he had hitherto kept for himself.

    Poor Tiger with the identity crisis and the resulting hole in his soul bowed so low that he apologised to White America as though the consensual sex was rape. He apologised for doing what most white men in his position would do and often do – commit adultery and foop as many women as throw themselves at them.

    How was it their business? He is a golfer, not a priest! But oh dear… it was white women! How dare he!

    Poor Tiger needs therapy, and plenty of it. Then he needs to figure out who the hell he is and be happy with it.

    And he must stop trying to fit in with the RH white man! They are mostly rejoicing at his downfall anyway so that Phil Mickleson or whoever can claim to be the GOAT.

  4. Donna Avatar
    Donna

    Northern Observer,

    I know nothing about the person except what I gleaned from a quick internet search.

    His appearance out of nowhere and with such frequency, bombarding us with particular views aroused my suspicions.

    The internet confirmed some of my suspicions about his background and status and hence his likely perspective.

  5. GP Avatar
    GP

    RE If BAMP really cared they would have put together a massive medical team to review all the COVID studies, research and protocols various doctors have been using around the world to varying degrees of success to see how we can cheaply treat this COVID thing and open up the country.

    THERE IS NO NEED FOR THAT SIR.
    OVER THE COURSE OF THE YEAR MANY SUCH STUDIES RESEARCH AND REGIMES HAVE BEEN PRESENTED ON BU BY MANY AND SUNDRY PERSONS

    I HAVE BEEN TELLING YOU WHAT SHOULD BE DONE FOR DAYS AND WHY.

    ON DR DOUGHLINS BLOG LAST YEAR I EXPLAINED WHO THE HEAVY METAL CATIONS HE SUGGESTED ASSIST IN FIGHTING DISEASE

    ON DR DOUGHLINS ADVICE I HAVE MYSELF BEEN USING CHROMIUM IRON ZINC AND ALSO VIT D

    LATER IN THE YEAR FREEDOM MADE A POST ABOUT A US DR WHO WAS USING HEAVY METAL CATIONS ALONG WITH QUININE BECAUSE HYDROXYQUINOLONE WAS BANNED BY THE INJUDICIOUS ADVICE OF DR FALSY

    ON VIEWING THAT VIDEO MY WIFE AND I IMMEDIATELY STARTED, AND HAVE SINCE BEEN DRINKING QUININE DAILY

    THEY ARE JACKASSES ON THIS BLOG LAUGHING BECAUSE I SAID I WAS APPARENTLY EXPOSED TO COVID

    BUT IT DID NOT AFFECT ME BECAUSE OF MY PROPHYLACTIC USE OF THE ABOVE REGIMEN

    LATER A POST ON BU BY LADYBUG INDICATED THAT THE REASON DRS ALL OVER THE WORLD STARTED TO USE HYDROXYQUINOLONE BECAUSE THE MECHANISM OF ACTION FOR THIS ANTI MALARIAL IN COUNTERACTING CORONAVIRUSES WAS DOCUMENTED IN HARRISON’S TEXT BOOK OF MEDICINE

    THE ANSWERS HAVE BEEN GIVEN ON BU REPEATEDLY CRITICAL ANALYZER……AND VERY CLEARLY ALSO. DESPITE HAVING BEEN LAUGHED TO SCORN , I HAVE ALSO EXPLAINED HOW THESE HETEROCYCLICS PREVENT RNA PEPLICATION BY BLOCKING THE TRANSCRIPTION/TRANSLATION PROCESS, AND HOW THESE AGENTS ACT AS SCAVENGERS AND ANTIOXIDANTS.

    THAT IS A CHEAP REGIME THAT SHOULD BE FOLLOWED ALONG WITH VACINES

  6. Lawson Avatar
    Lawson

    Droopy ass white women???? lindsey and erin ???? but I think you have a chance of saving him from these sirens …because .he said he was a little bit stiff………..not a lot a bit stiff

  7. TheOGazerts Avatar
    TheOGazerts

    Great reggae music.
    I enjoyed the one with reference to Rome. Had me hooked even before I heard the artist.

  8. Donna Avatar
    Donna

    Yup! Droopy ass white women! Like wilting flowers.

    But hark! The vultures are circling! A whole damn press conference on Tiger’s car accident. Going on and on and on! Journalist’s going in for the kill!

    Really? Tiger is just a man, a golfer. Why all the fuss????

  9. GP Avatar
    GP

    CRITICAL WE HAVE A PENCHANT IN BARBADOS FOR LAUGHING AND IGNORING OUR VERY OWN, BUT E O DOUGHLIN WAS TELLING US HERE ON BU WHAT OTHERS STARTED TO DO LATER ON AND THE POST BY THE HATED AND DESPISED FREEDOM POST ON QUININE SENT ME TO REVIEW THE HETEROCYCLIC CHEMISTRY I LEARNED AT CAVE HILL YEARS AGO, AND I APPLIED IT EFFECTIVELY.

    SO I CAN SPEAK WITH AUTHORITY AND EMPIRICALLY ABOUT THE MATTER DESPITE THE SCORN POURED ON ME BY TWO STUPID SEMI ILLITERATES ON THIS BLOG.

  10. TheOGazerts Avatar
    TheOGazerts

    Watching NO destroy his reputation..

    Suggesting he pretends not to know the houses and places Lawson is talking about.

  11. Critical Analyzer Avatar
    Critical Analyzer

    @GP February 23, 2021 7:12 PM

    I beg to differ, BAMP needs to be made to feel it came from them and not some over-the-hill doctor like you or non-doctor like me that have been posting about those studies and success stories all the way back in March or April last year.

  12. TheOGazerts Avatar
    TheOGazerts

    Be thankful for Mia. Be thankful for what you got.
    Called all over NJ today to get the vaccine. My search was a failure….
    https://youtu.be/Pvtlt-p7vB4

  13. TheOGazerts Avatar
    TheOGazerts

    I don’t believe half of the stuff I read here, but I bought tonic water and take my vitamin D tablets.

  14. RICHARD PETKO Avatar
    RICHARD PETKO

    @plt – claiming one country handled covid over another and basing it on deaths or cases is the entire problem in this pandemic.

    The fact is a vast majority of your “death” data around the world are people who did not die OF Covid but With Covid.. A positive PCR test indicates you have a molecule or two or ten thousand of sars-cov2 in your body. That does not mean you are sick or even have
    Covid or even die from it. We see across the Western world deaths from nursing homes ranging from 60% to 85% of “deaths”.
    In canada or the usa or the EU when you go into an assisted care nursing facility you have on average 8 months to live. If you have had a stroke and have dementia and your brain is wasting away and have no immune system and catch the sars-cov2 and die 2 weeks later, you will have all of the above listed as well as covid as cause of death. However you did not die of Covid, you died because you were on your way out to put in plain terms.
    I can use my own 93 year old grandfather who went into a nursing facility following a heart attack and having late stage dementia. Guess what, he died within 3 months of entry – with the flu. However the flu was his companion on the way out, it was nowhere near his actual cause of death.
    Trust me when I say I value life dearly, believe it or not more dearly than others as I am anti-war and anti-violence in any way. That is why this Covid over-reaction fiasco pains me so much. Even if the 2.2 million people who died with Covid actually only died because of Covid, I would still say open society and open the economy because probably 10 times more people have died from starvation, missed vaccinations, missed medical diagnoses because everything was shut down to try and prevent this flu bug. Not to mention 200 million children have suffered a loss of education, as well as our university level cohort who are getting a shitty university level experience as well.

    This argument that everything is about a covid death and one covid death is a tragedy is pure hyperbolic rhetoric.
    You with your expansive knowledge should know and agree the recipe of life and society is more than one ingredient “no covid”

    When it comes to BAMP and a 14 day quarantine, the only place on the world where it has sort of worked is New Zealand and Australia. However, in those economies as well we see recessions (the first in australia in 25 years) and record unemployment rates. Many studies show unemployment is an actual cause of death by the way, so I can imagine that Australia’s unemployment rate going from 4% to 9% actually will cause death as well.
    Barbados is a lovely island of 280,000 people. It is dependent on tourism and visitors and always shall be. You can’t diversify an economy with such a small population base and zero natural resources; no matter how many wishes you or anyone on BU may have.
    With a 14 day quarantine you may as well say goodbye to the economy and start a massive emigration program to help the people leave and find jobs in functional economies.

    To conclude yes, I stick to my point that Costa Rica, Aruba, Jamaica, Colombia have all handled this situation better because they have handled all aspects better; and claiming that deaths as a percentage of population or cases are the one measuring stick that matters is completely wrong.

  15. Lawson Avatar
    Lawson

    the way things are going get gin for the tonic and a fishing rod so you dont have to stand in line at massey

  16. peterlawrencethompson Avatar
    peterlawrencethompson

    @RICHARD PETKO February 23, 2021 7:46 PM
    So do you admit that your statement “The per capita case numbers are the same in all 3 countries” was a lie, or was it just a mistake?

  17. GP Avatar
    GP

    CRITICAL ANALYSER

    I AM DEFINITELY NOT OVER THE HILL, SIR
    PERHAPS THESE YOUNGSTERS DONT READ BU
    THE FEW HERE THAT READ IT ARE SO BUSY SEEKING TO PULL YOU AND I DOWN, THAT THEY CAN NOT SEE CLEARLY.

    I HAVE SAT QUIETLY AND WATCHED FOR MOST OF THE YEAR. SAYING NOTHING WHILE ALL THE SMART ALECS BARKED AND BRAYED AND BRIMBLED ON.

    I THOUGHT SURELY THEY MUST BE SOME WISE PERSON SOME WHERE WITH VISION WHO COULD AND WOULD SEE THINGS CLEARLY

    BUT I GUESS SOMETHINGS ARE SPIRITUALLY REVEALED
    SUCH CLARITY WONT BE GIVEN TO DEMONS LIKE MR FALSY

    AND YET A PIECE OF SCUM ON BU TODAY INSULTED ME BY SUGGESTING THAT I FOLLOWED THAT IDIOT, AS IF THERE IS NOT A GOD IN HEAVEN TO GUIDE AND PROTECT ME, AND SHOW ME HOW TO USE MY TRAINING.

  18. Hants Avatar
    Hants

    @ Donna.

    I can say with absolute certainty ” all saltfish sweet.” Applies to droopy ass white women as well llol

  19. GP Avatar
    GP

    OH BTW CRITICAL I HAVE LONG NOT TAKEN BAMP SERIOUSLY OR EVEN BEEN A MEMBER

  20. Donna Avatar
    Donna

    Yank yank! Tee hee!

    Bare mock sport in de rumshop!

    Murdaaaah!

  21. peterlawrencethompson Avatar
    peterlawrencethompson

    @RICHARD PETKO February 23, 2021 7:46 PM
    I never claimed “that deaths as a percentage of population or cases are the one measuring stick that matters…” but they are an important basis of comparison because ALL the countries count deaths with covid as deaths from covid. That is well known and is not the issue here. All of the other countries you mention have suffered deep economic damage just as Barbados has, even the ones who are less dependent on tourism than Barbados. You made no effort to evaluate or compare this economic damage. The only things you compared were “the per capita case numbers” erroneously… and the ability to avoid the inconveniences of testing, quarantine, and reduced air traffic.

    The only possible conclusion that I can draw is that you place a greater value on your personal convenience than on other people’s lives, well being, or economic survival.

    In any case, because all of your arguments were based on the erroneous premise that “The per capita case numbers are the same in all 3 countries” it is obvious that you reach erroneous conclusions. In any logical argument garbage in results in garbage out.

  22. Donna Avatar
    Donna

    I leave PLT to argue with Petko. I scroll past.

  23. GP Avatar
    GP

    HANTS
    I THOUGHT THAT YOU FISHED FOR PIKE AND SALMON AND BASK
    I DID NOT KNOW YOU CAUGHT COD AND HADDOCK TOO

  24. Donna Avatar
    Donna

    Hants,

    For me sex is more than a wuk up and a brek. I know for most men it is different. I have heard the stories about women who were dissed in the day and dicked at night.

  25. peterlawrencethompson Avatar
    peterlawrencethompson

    @RICHARD PETKO February 23, 2021 7:46 PM
    “You can’t diversify an economy with such a small population base and zero natural resources…”
    +++++++++++++++++
    Absolute Bullshit!! In fact Bajans have done so twice within my own lifetime. Firstly away from sugar cane monoculture to tourism, and then to global financial services in addition to tourism. There is not the slightest doubt that Bajans will do so again and again in coming decades and centuries.

    You must really have a terribly low opinion of us to think we could never manage what we have already accomplished.

  26. Donna Avatar
    Donna

    TheO,

    My father and mother have both been vaccinated. My younger brother took our mother and was vaccinated the same time. Line was moving smoothly.

    They are on at me to register because of my asthma. Sent me the link this morning. My thinking was that since I seldom venture out I could wait until the next cycle so that others who have to go out daily could be protected first. I’ll register tomorrow..

  27. TheOGazerts Avatar
    TheOGazerts

    “I have heard the stories about women who were dissed in the day and dicked at night.”

    I remember an old female rum drinker who was being publicly disrespected by a young man. The crowd ‘bawl’ when she looked him in the face and told him “Night has no eye”.

    He was the kind of guy that would hide and “do work”.

  28. RICHARD PETKO Avatar
    RICHARD PETKO

    @plt
    I see that my data has to be spot on for you. Let me then drill down. Yes aruba and Barbados currently and for the past 2-3 weeks have the same per capita case numbers. Notwithstanding even this can be changed by the difference in total tests made daily as we see Barbados has 61 positives instead of the 19 yesterday but today we had 850 tests and yesterday 375 or so.
    The past 3 weeks Barbados is averaging 45 cases daily. It’s hard to be exact because of the cockup with backlog tests.
    Aruba averages 20 cases daily. However Aruba actually has tourists who take a PCR test at the airport. So on Sunday for example Aruba had 19 cases but 8 were arriving tourists leaving us with 11 domestics. So yes more or less the magic metric of case numbers is the same per capita.
    I may not be as punctilious as yoiu in my proof reading or statistical roundup as you tend to be, but if you have not seen my point I shall make it simple. Cases don’t matter!
    I use cases to point out that be it 20 or 200 the fact is 99.99% of people have no negative medical result from Sars-Cov2 . However lockdown affects everyone in many more detrimental and dangerous and long term ways than covid.
    The government lauds the 60,000 care packages sent out, but guess what a kilogram of sweet potatoes doesn’t pay the rent or the flow bill or buys baby food.
    If you have found a magic formula that can make a country with 40% unemployment function then I think you should drive up to Illaro court or Sandiford centre or wherever the government is deliberating and tell them what to do. I can with 100% confidence enforcing a 14 day quarantine on all incoming visitors is not even close to the answer

  29. John A Avatar
    John A

    Of course we can diversify this economy and quickly if our leaders would just take off the myopic tourism glasses they have been wearing for the past 30 years.

    We could move in 6 months into both alternative energy and agriculture if we stop talking and acted. First we need to accept that a USD saved is a USD earned. Once that is done we can then move forward with the process of diversification.

    Regrettable our leaders seem bent on holding on to the embers of tourism with the hope that they will soon bear light again

  30. RICHARD PETKO Avatar
    RICHARD PETKO

    @PLT I live here and love it here and don’t have a low opinion of bajans. But don’t feed me this crap that the economy is diversified. Before covid the unemployment rate was 10% with another 10% being underemployed.
    I would actually argue that not focusing on the core competency which in Barbados case is the natural gift of weather is why Barbados doesn’t have full employment and instead is one of the most in debt nations in the world. Michael Porter proves that countries should develop “clusters” and not every cluster in the world but a cluster. The fact is you can’t compare the hotel product here to Cancun or Aruba or Bahamas or especially Dubai.
    Barbados should focus on tourism, short medium and long-term as well as your preferred WS. It should hyper focus on this. Wasting breath and effort on talking about diversifying an economy with 280 thousand people is economically a fairy tale.

  31. TheOGazerts Avatar
    TheOGazerts

    I am hibernating. Not as much as the man who was saying one thing on BU and doing another in Florida 😃

  32. Hants Avatar
    Hants

    @ Donna who wrote ” because of my asthma.”

    You and me have that in common. We could use our Advair and Ventolin ( AS ADVISED BY DR.GP )

    and try to discover the power of love..

    nuh doan mine me . I just dreaming. lol

  33. RICHARD PETKO Avatar
    RICHARD PETKO

    Another little circumstance brought on by quarantine.
    There is a company named Medilex which services 30% of Barbados high tech medical equipment such as a retinal scanner.
    Right now due to quarantine they are not sending a technician here. They will not send one or find a willing employee to go through the protocols here.
    Thus we have some high tech medical machines currently not in operation in Barbados. Unfortunately zoom or WhatsApp video do not suffice to repair a broken high tech device.

  34. Donna Avatar
    Donna

    Oh dear me! Just saw a Tiger Woods clip with Oprah where he told her how many golf clubs refused him entry and how many racial slurs he endured from the golf clubbers.

    The man is 45 years old. For those who dismiss our constant focus on race and our consideration of race as a factor in every situation, just think about when it was that a 45 year old man was denied entry to golf clubs on account of his race and suffered constant racial abuse when he did manage to get in.

    Was it the 70s? Was it the 80s? More likely the 90s!

    But that’s all done now, isn’t it?

  35. RICHARD PETKO Avatar
    RICHARD PETKO

    @plt concerning economic diversity
    We have a Canadian buying 400 acres looking to grow traditional and new crops.
    Claims he has 15 employees and at full production will have 40! Wow 40!
    If that 400 acres was a Las Vegas type hotel it would probably employ 2000!
    https://epaper.barbadostoday.bb/infinity/article_popover_share.aspx?guid=85239ae5-4aa5-40a3-bba3-b10292a9192b
    As you may know I am from Canada. Guess what we don’t grow Bananas or pineapple or okra or watermelon, we could, we could build massive greenhouses on 2000 acres and do it. But instead we have automobile manufacturing on that land and have 4000 people employed instead of the 50 the banana greenhouse might have. Dubai could do the same, they don’t. They get the most value from an acre of desert that they can.
    Job per acre is much higher with tourism as opposed to food production.
    It is a romantic old notion of this “food independence ” countries speak of. But other than the USA there probably isn’t a single food independent country on the globe. Weather matters

  36. TheOGazerts Avatar
    TheOGazerts

    @PK
    Perhaps diversification is the wrong word. Our small population makes it possible for us to transition from tourism to other sources of employment.

    It is not millions or hundreds of thousands that we need to find employment for. If only we could successfully identify a few new areas of employment.

    IT has to be one of those areas.

  37. peterlawrencethompson Avatar
    peterlawrencethompson

    RICHARD PETKO February 23, 2021 8:26 PM
    “… 99.99% of people have no negative medical result from Sars-Cov2.”
    +++++++++++++++
    This is arrant nonsense again. I will confess that yes indeed “data has to be spot” on for me, otherwise it is not data but lying with statistics. There is a world of difference between 99.99% and 97.78% (which is the statistical ratio of tracked global recoveries to deaths during the pandemic so far. The difference is a factor of over two thousand in the estimate of lethality. You can’t just throw around made up nonsense numbers like 99.99% and expect to be taken seriously.

    This does not even take into account that a significant percentage of people who survive covid have medical issues as a result of the infection.

    If you are going to propose public policy changes you owe it to yourself to get your basic facts and numbers right, otherwise you just come off as cranky and clueless.

  38. Tron Avatar
    Tron

    @RICHARD PETKO
    February 23, 2021 8:32 PM

    You are the voice of reason here on BU. By April at the latest, when enough people in Barbados have been vaccinated, we will have to return fully to tourism. The economic damage is already enormous.

    The real reason why many commentators on BU want a long quarantine and the withdrawal from tourism is obvious: they want to establish some kind of tropical nationalist-socialist state, crossbreed of Zimbabwe, Nazi Germany and North Korean Chuch’e ideology. The same people who lament when the black masses without tourists have to work on the plantation again because of poverty.

    Anyone who dies of COVID19 despite vaccination must accept this as a general risk of life. COVID19 is not a medical problem, but a psychological problem under tropical conditions like barbados. A comparison: We do not lock up all native men because they tend to be violent compared to Northern Europe, Singapore and Japan, if we believe the murder statistics. Or should we? If we follow our quarantine Taliban, we would have to lock them up until they proved their non-dangerousness. Not that anyone misunderstands me: That is an argumentum ad absurdum. As usual.

  39. TheOGazerts Avatar
    TheOGazerts

    @PK
    I am beginning to like you.

    400 acres is 0.625 square miles. That is a significant amount of land in an island that is 166 square miles. No foreigner should be allowed to buy that quantity of land in Barbados.

    I also like your point about employment numbers.

    If we have foreigners buying large tracts of land and employing one or two persons to work that land. I would hate to see what the island would like in a few years. We are marching towards that South Africa abandon.

    NB: our limestone cannot accommodate high rise buildings. If you continue to sell large tracts of land, you will bypass the South African model as some will have to live in caves.

    Fuck your literacy rate; open your eyes.

  40. ks Avatar
    ks

    Four days ago, the authorities stated that no walk-ins will be accommodated yet many people without appointments tell me they went and got the vaccine, after those with appointments, were given the vaccine. This ‘news’ will spread and we will be back to the large crowds outside the Polyclinics!

    Meanwhile, I still await the call to inform me of my appointment, after registering over a week ago ….. and I am just a few months from 70 years old….. but how do I check if I am even on the List???

    Confused!

  41. TheOGazerts Avatar
    TheOGazerts

    That mad woman Wura is right.

  42. Disgusting Lies & Propaganda TV Avatar
    Disgusting Lies & Propaganda TV

    “The fact is a vast majority of your “death” data around the world are people who did not die OF Covid but With Covid.. A positive PCR test indicates you have a molecule or two or ten thousand of sars-cov2 in your body. That does not mean you are sick or even have
    Covid or even die from it.”

    @ Richard Petko This “interpretation” is based on a lack of understanding how this virus kills and is contributing to why this virus is not being taken seriously.
    I will use the AIDS analogy (sort of). HIV doesn’t kill you. HIV causes AIDS which causes you to die from other infections. The SARS-Cov2 virus causes Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). In this case, the COMORBIDITIES(IN MOST PEOPLE) along with age, is what causes a depressed immune system. Unlike HIV, the Sars virus directly attacks the lungs and other organs. Sars-Cov2 kills you faster with a depressed immune system. With these deaths, it is a case that even with NCDs you would be alive WERE IT NOT for the SARS-Cov2 infection. If you catch Covid-19 it is a race between the virus causing disease and the immune system catching up to stop it. In most people the immune system eventually catches up with varying side effects. A vaccine helps the immune system catch up even faster.

  43. David Avatar
    David

    @ks

    Why wait, go to the nearest clinic tomorrow morning.

  44. peterlawrencethompson Avatar
    peterlawrencethompson

    @RICHARD PETKO February 23, 2021 8:44 PM
    I am also Canadian, but I know diversifying the Bajan economy does not mean that it will resemble the Canadian one that is 350 times as big. I also know that agriculture will never again employ a large fraction of the Bajan workforce because in order to be efficient agriculture will be mechanised and computerised.

    However we are perfectly capable of creating new sectors of the economy that employ 5,000 or more people and earn hundreds of millions of USD. Making such a transition is not nearly as hard as those entrenched defenders of the status quo insist. For example the tourism industry directly employed about 15,000 people before the pandemic, although some of those were seasonal. In order to prop up the hotel owners (think election campaign contributions) the Barbados government found $300 million to help them through tough times. Stupid move. They could simply have used the same $300 million to pay each and every hotel worker a $20,000 over a year in which they could retrain for opportunities like photovoltaic installations, repair and maintenance (that sector is begging people to train and work for them). Bingo! The unemployment rate stays at its historical level, and the growth of import replacement energy sources gets a big boost. The only thing standing in the way is our traditional political corruption.

  45. Tron Avatar
    Tron

    @ksFebruary 23, 2021 9:09 PM

    Our vaccination system is not bureaucratic, but flexible. This allows us to speed up the process. Soon we will even have overtaken Israel and Great Britain. My friends in New York and Zurich are just enthusiastic about the rate of vaccination on our island. I would not be surprised if soon tourists come to get vaccinated here.

    Thank you, Most Honourable Prime Minister Mia Mottley!

  46. Critical Analyzer Avatar
    Critical Analyzer

    @David February 23, 2021 9:15 PM

    Please don’t encourage ks to go down there in the hot sun and collapse waiting in a line.

    Government needs to get this fiasco right and it is very simple to do. Do not vaccinate at the polyclinics, only at schools or other non-medical facilities. Strict appointments ONLY policy with guards at the front gate turning away persons not on the list.

  47. WURA-War-on-U Avatar
    WURA-War-on-U

    “Stupid move. They could simply have used the same $300 million to pay each and every hotel worker a $20,000 over a year in which they could retrain for opportunities like photovoltaic installations, repair and maintenance (that sector is begging people to train and work for them). Bingo! The unemployment rate stays at its historical level, and the growth of import replacement energy sources gets a big boost. The only thing standing in the way is our traditional political corruption.”

    stupid sell out leaders, they even deprived the hotel workers of compensation/severance, them and the tiefing hoteliers….these 2 legged snakes just don’t want to see the majority Black population free and independent…and for that we will have to very closely monitor them….these times call for that…they are on watch and need to come to grips with the truth that they’re not a 1/4 as intelligent as they believe themselves to be…there will be NO reintroduction of slavery UNLESS it’s on the world stage show.. ..let everyone see the actors in living color.

  48. Cuhdear Bajan Avatar
    Cuhdear Bajan

    Again Richard Petko is suggesting more death for Bajans and their visitors. He quotes data from Florida, Costa Rica, and Aruba.

    The death rates from Covid19 for those places :
    Florida, 1390 deaths per million
    Aruba 663 deaths per million
    Costa Rica 543 deaths per million
    Barbados 108 per million

    If we follow Petko’s advice and acted as Florida has done we would have about 350 deaths by now.
    If we follow Petko’s advice and acted as Aruba has done we would have about 170 deaths by now.
    If we follow Petko’s advice and acted as Costa Rica has done we would have about140 deaths by now.

    Richard Petko may be comfortable with the deaths of an additional 32 to 242 primarily black and brown people. I am not.

    I suggest that Richard Petko be Covid19 death number 33. I am very, very comfortable with that.

  49. Cuhdear Bajan Avatar
    Cuhdear Bajan

    @RICHARD PETKO February 23, 2021 8:49 AM “a doctor or epidemiologist looking through their highly focused lens on ONE outcome – no covid”

    Nobody has suggested no covid.

    Everybody has suggested minimising covid.

    We have a limited number of ventilators. What happens when people begin to need ventilators and there are none? Do we pull Richard Petko off his ventilator?

  50. Cuhdear Bajan Avatar
    Cuhdear Bajan

    @Sargeant February 23, 2021 2:46 PM “When John gets an idea in his head it becomes an obsession…Now the latest about water borne COVID, he is wasting his talent here he should send his findings to every scientific publication or the many scientists doing research on the subject, they would welcome another brilliant mind to the herd.”

    Because John was brilliant at 17 it does not mean that he is brilliant at 67. You know don’t you that some of us at 67 are being diapered and spoon fed in nursing homes.

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