News that the Ministry of Public Health, Social Development and Labour VSA hopes to vaccinate all adults by the start of the 2021 Atlantic hurricane season (see Friday/Saturday edition) was obviously welcome. Although perhaps ambitious, it is always better to have set target dates.
Some wondered what one has to do with the other, but – for example – social distancing would be difficult in a storm shelter. That was already a potential issue raised last year during the period when tropical weather systems are most prevalent in the area, with the COVID-19 pandemic still raging.
Government also confirmed that the vaccines will be provided without cost to every inhabitant including undocumented residents. The importance of that cannot be overstated to achieve “herd immunity” and make any local resurgence of COVID-19 highly unlikely.
It is good to realise as well, that being part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands makes this possible for the Dutch Caribbean. As independent countries, receiving such free-of-charge help would not necessarily be a forgone conclusion for St. Maarten, Aruba and Curaçao.
On the latter two islands the British variant has been detected too, making it even more urgent to vaccinate their populations. For St. Maarten, keeping up with the French side where the campaign is well underway remains a separate goal.
There is a story in today’s paper on how the International Red Cross plans to assist poorer nations by vaccinating 500 million people worldwide to combat “vaccination inequality” whereby these states get far fewer vaccines than richer ones. The project of 92 million euros starting in 66 countries attempts to narrow this gap but will take a while to realise.
In the meantime, no matter how you look at it, not having that problem is something to be thankful for.
