Cabinet relaxes COVID-19 protocols
Cabinet has decided to relax some of the territory’s COVID-19 protocols as a result of the declining number of cases recorded in the territory.
Announcing the decisions last night, the Minister of Health Carvin Malone said Cabinet made several amendments to the current protocols which include gathering sizes as well as quarantine period.
“Cabinet decided that the current crowd list of 100 people be removed and would be limited for one person to every nine square feet. This means unlimited numbers but limited to one per nine square feet in each establishment. Cabinet has decided that organisers of large events in excess of 300 persons should notify the Environmental Health Authority of the date, time and location of the events,” Malone announced.
“Cabinet has decided that the quarantine period of unvaccinated persons entering the territory will be moved from seven days to five days. These changes will come into force when gazetted and should expire on the 31st of March 2022,” the Health Minister added.
He said, in the interim, the protocols which remain are the requirement for masks, the requirement to wash hands and sanitise, as well as the requirements to exercise proper hygiene, maintain a social distance of at least three feet, and all the common-sense approaches that have kept the territory safe in the past two years.
Malone also encouraged residents to continue with the vaccination uptake including the booster shots.
“To date, we have 17,459 persons that are deemed fully vaccinated which is a rate of 58.2 per cent. We also have a booster that was recently made available, and we have 3,652 persons who have taken advantage of this opportunity. This represents 12.2 per cent. We are concerned that the vaccination rate for boosters is not as robust as it could be,” he said.
This month marks two years since COVID-19 was declared a global pandemic. Since then, the lab at the Dr D Orlando Smith Hospital has analysed more than 100,000 samples. From this, the health minister said, there were 6,091 cases with 6,006 recoveries. There have been 62 deaths of persons who were deemed positive with COVID-19 during this period.
Less than two dozen active cases remain.
“We are down from the heights of 1,300 down to where there are active cases if 23. One person is hospitalised at this time,” Malone said.
“Cabinet decided that the current crowd list of 100 people be removed and would be limited for one person to every nine square feet. This means unlimited numbers but limited to one per nine square feet in each establishment. Cabinet has decided that organisers of large events in excess of 300 persons should notify the Environmental Health Authority of the date, time and location of the events,” Malone announced.
“Cabinet has decided that the quarantine period of unvaccinated persons entering the territory will be moved from seven days to five days. These changes will come into force when gazetted and should expire on the 31st of March 2022,” the Health Minister added.
He said, in the interim, the protocols which remain are the requirement for masks, the requirement to wash hands and sanitise, as well as the requirements to exercise proper hygiene, maintain a social distance of at least three feet, and all the common-sense approaches that have kept the territory safe in the past two years.
Malone also encouraged residents to continue with the vaccination uptake including the booster shots.
“To date, we have 17,459 persons that are deemed fully vaccinated which is a rate of 58.2 per cent. We also have a booster that was recently made available, and we have 3,652 persons who have taken advantage of this opportunity. This represents 12.2 per cent. We are concerned that the vaccination rate for boosters is not as robust as it could be,” he said.
This month marks two years since COVID-19 was declared a global pandemic. Since then, the lab at the Dr D Orlando Smith Hospital has analysed more than 100,000 samples. From this, the health minister said, there were 6,091 cases with 6,006 recoveries. There have been 62 deaths of persons who were deemed positive with COVID-19 during this period.
Less than two dozen active cases remain.
“We are down from the heights of 1,300 down to where there are active cases if 23. One person is hospitalised at this time,” Malone said.
