In these times of great peril and much uncertainty regarding the future, one looks for signs of hope and assurance. Some of that is provided by St. Maarten’s closest neighbours in today’s edition of the newspaper.
Anguilla, with no suspected or active COVID-19 cases, has removed all restrictions on movement and gatherings, allowing a myriad of business to reopen.
Of course, social distancing must still be practised, but life is returning to relative normalcy. Borders obviously stay closed, which means tourism as the island’s main source of income cannot be resumed for now.
The French side of St. Maarten/St. Martin is part of a national gradual and progressive exit from the lockdown starting May 15. The Collectivité has enlisted 36 seamstresses to make washable, reusable facemasks, while the “Ile de France” region is providing 10,000 disposable ones and a local entrepreneur has also offered to make 270 visors using plastic sheets provided by government for persons in direct contact with the general public.
St. Eustatius, for its part, is looking to reopen schools on Monday, May 4, having seemingly contained the local spread of coronavirus. They have been closed since March 30 and the main issue is with exam and pre-exam students because not all are actively participating in distance learning, although the success rate with such has reportedly been good.
Mind you, incoming travel to both Saba and Statia remains prohibited until May 15. When people may again be able to go there from St. Maarten will very much be determined by the COVID-19 situation here.
And that in turn depends on the population’s behaviour, because widespread testing, its results and the number of infections will probably be the deciding factors. Everyone is getting understandably tired or even desperate about the restrictions and their socioeconomic impact, but must exercise a bit more patience because the “end of the beginning” at least appears in sight.
