Virgin Islands Faces One Stark Choice On Covid-19

Dickson Igwe, Resident Socio-Political Commentator

The country will have to decide on two choices in the midst of a Commission of Inquiry that is taking up most of the oxygen in the room, and a hurricane season as unpredictable as the season when Hurricanes Irma and Maria wreaked havoc in the land.

The first choice is to lockdown and step back into mid 2020, and see the fragile economic recovery destroyed. This is the worst of the options and will see further business bankruptcies and job loss. The country is already suffering increased poverty as a result of the Pandemic.

The second choice is to go on as now, as normal, keeping the country open, and to manage the pandemic with a ramped up vaccination program.

This second choice also poses significant risks and carries caveats. Can the country handle a large Covid-19 outbreak? In a country with residents who have significant underlying health conditions can the country manage the fallout in terms of illness and death?

The vaccination is meant to solve the preceding danger. Vaccination will not prevent infection. However from the evidence abroad it significantly reduces the risk of infection, illness, and death.

Consequently a ramped up vaccination program is the solution, while we all live normally.

The BVI could have been close to the place where we need to be, not worrying too much about the dangers of Covid-19, had it not been for the conspiracy theories about the vaccine from ”specific quarters” especially churches.

Consequently, residents who have not been vaccinated should do so immediately,  unless they are in danger owing to specific underlying medical conditions.

And the government and business community should carry on with economic recovery,  using the tool of vaccination to manage the crisis. 

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