Not everyone is happy with the reintroduction of a 12:00am business closure for two weeks effective April 14 announced in Thursday’s newspaper. After all, affected companies and their employees have already suffered greatly from the pandemic’s destructive impact on their livelihoods for more than a year, and the number of daily COVID-19 infections remains relatively low.
Nevertheless, the threat of another spike as happened on the so-called ABC islands is real. In that same edition Dutch caretaker State Secretary of Public Health, Welfare and Sport Paul Blokhuis said St. Maarten had been advised to take measures against the influx and spread of the British variant of COVID-19 that wreaked havoc particularly in Curaçao.
An added risk is the open border with the French side, where this more contagious form of the disease has been circulating. Guadeloupe-based Regional Health Agency ARS also on Thursday reported nine of these cases from a total of 11 detected in week 13.
While relevant current figures on both sides of the island are not alarming, the potential for a medical crisis clearly exists and must be prevented. Numerous gatherings over the long Easter weekend without adhering to social distancing and facemask-wearing protocols were hardly helpful.
In fact, Secondary Education School Board SVOBE mentioned “our teenagers” attending such events as reason to continue its blended learning approach. This despite Minister of Education, Culture, Youth and Sports (ECYS) Rodolphe Samuel having earlier announced a full return to the classrooms from next Monday.
Regarding the new mandatory closing time, some argue that one cannot only be infected after midnight. That is obviously true, but people who are partying at entertainment venues during those early morning hours do tend to lose their inhibitions especially when it involves the consumption of alcohol and/or drugs.
Besides, the measure is just for two weeks and by then a considerable part of the population hopefully will have been vaccinated so no extension may be needed. For now, this seems like an example of the saying “better safe than sorry.”
