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Trinidad and Tobago: “It is with the concern I noted today in Parliament that the Prime Minister indicated that much of the surge in Covid-19 cases that our nation is currently experiencing is due to the ‘Candlelight Vigils’ held in memory of Andrea Bharatt. Our fallen sister’s funeral was held on Friday 12th February 2021 and the vigils came to a halt a short time after, said MP for Caroni East, Dr Rishad Seecheran.
In a local article on 25th March 2021, Dr Avery Hinds said, “Even though the recent health conferences have concentrated on clusters around Trinidad, we are still listed in low-level community spread. This was six weeks after Andrea Bharatt’s funeral.”
But in another article on 28th April 2021, when we had 223 new Covid-19 cases, Dr Avery Hinds attributed the rise of cases to gathering and domestic travel. The article said that the daily, rolling average of Covid-19 cases has been rising since the end of February 2021, which multiplied following the four-day holiday weekend.
He accused that the Prime Minister considerably relaxed Health Restrictions on 18th March 2021, and explicitly stated “Anyone who wants to go to Tobago can go and come back when you want, Tobago is almost full and overflowing, the place to be is in Tobago. And I tell you the best vacation you can have at home is in Trinidad and Tobago is in Tobago.”
MP further stated that Minister Sinanan then told 50,000 persons moved between Trinidad and Tobago. This was the first mass movement of people since the pandemic started and it was PM Rowley who allowed persons in Trinidad to travel without a PCR Test.
“Prime Minster Rowley should admit to the Nation that the science proves beyond a doubt that he relaxed the Health Restrictions and allowed Inter-Island Travel far too soon and at a time with an exceedingly small minority of our population vaccinated.”
“The Prime Minister should instead now concentrate on increasing testing efficiency and capacity, resolving major medical supply shortages at our Nation’s Covid-19 hospitals, ensuring Vaccines are put correctly into arms and asking for international assistance with increasing our oxygen supply to our Hospitals. May God bless our Frontline Workers during this time.”
