NEWS

Work from Home

Unease is growing over the possible economic ramifications of a protracted coronavirus outbreak in this country, including a decimation of the healthy workforce. As such, businessmen and members of the Employers Consultative Association (ECA) have been holding discussions on ways and means of mitigating the effects of the virus. One such suggestion, to have a work-from-home protocol for staff facing quarantine because of the coronavirus is being made by the ECA and TT Chamber of Industry and Commerce. Both have begun meeting to collect ideas on how workplaces can cope with the threat of the disease. Chamber CEO Gabriel Faria told Newsday his group has held talks with the ministries of Health and Trade, including discussing the virus’ potential impact on the commercial sector. These talks came after Prime Minister Dr Rowley last week warned of potentially far-reaching economic implications for this country from coronavirus. Read more here

TRHA allays COVID-19 readiness fears

Amidst con­cerns that the ab­sence of two se­nior peo­ple may af­fect To­ba­go’s han­dling of COVID-19-re­lat­ed cas­es, To­ba­go Re­gion­al Health Au­thor­i­ty (TRHA) chair­man In­grid Melville is al­lay­ing is­landers’ fears. Con­cerns were raised about the TRHA’s abil­i­ty to han­dle any im­pend­ing COVID-19 threat af­ter Health Sec­re­tary Agatha Car­ring­ton re­signed on Feb­ru­ary 28 and CEO Shel­don Cyrus was fired on March 2. Speak­ing to Guardian Me­dia on the au­thor­i­ty’s ca­pac­i­ty to han­dle any pos­si­ble health sit­u­a­tion due to COVID-19, Melville said, “To­bag­o­ni­ans need not wor­ry.” She stressed that the pub­lic health de­part­ment is pri­mar­i­ly re­spon­si­ble for spear­head­ing ef­forts to man­age the sit­u­a­tion in ther event of a COVID-19 emer­gency, adding the TRHA is mak­ing sure the is­land’s health fa­cil­i­ties are equipped and ready if and when need­ed and would be able to “han­dle any case man­age­ment that may re­sult from any pa­tient with coro­n­avirus.” Read more here

POLITICS

More old folks get abused

Last year saw a doubling of the number of elderly people complaining of being abused to some 285 allegations, revealed Agriculture Minister Clarence Rambharat in Senate on Monday. Opposition Senator Wade Mark sought these details in a listed question where he asked what steps were being taken to stem the 12 cases reported each month. Rambharat said the number of reported cases of abuse last year was 285, which was up from 101 complaints in 2017 and 110 in 2018. Rambharat gave figures that showed that upon investigation, about half the allegations were confirmed as cases of abuse. Read more here

Deyalsingh: Health workers won’t get masks unless needed

There are more than enough N-95 masks in the pub­lic sec­tor in event of a COVID-19 out­break and a fur­ther 25,000 masks ar­rive next week - but health work­ers will on­ly get the masks if and when a COVID-19 case oc­curs. That’s the word from Health Min­is­ter Ter­rence Deyals­ingh, who replied to Op­po­si­tion ques­tions on the is­sue in the Sen­ate yes­ter­day. Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress Sen­a­tor Wade Mark had queried a re­port­ed short­age of the masks, which are re­quired by health care providers at­tend­ing to COVID-19 cas­es. The num­ber of glob­al cas­es are now over 90,000, in­clud­ing three in the Caribbean. Read more here

BUSINESS

Billion-dollar boost for T&T tourism

T&Ts tourism in­fra­struc­ture is set to get a bil­lion-dol­lar boost. “CAF—De­vel­op­ment Bank of Latin Amer­i­ca—ap­proved a US$200 mil­lion loan to sup­port T&T’s man­age­ment, plan­ning and in­vest­ment of tourism in­fra­struc­ture through bet­ter in­sti­tu­tion­al and reg­u­la­to­ry frame­works,” a re­lease from the CAF stat­ed yes­ter­day. “These funds will be man­aged by the Min­istry of Fi­nance and will sup­port dif­fer­ent on­go­ing in­sti­tu­tion­al ini­tia­tives, such as the up­grade of the Na­tion­al Tourism Pol­i­cy; the strate­gic plan for the Trinidad and To­ba­go’s Air­ports Au­thor­i­ty; the de­vel­op­ment of a Na­tion­al Mar­itime Pol­i­cy and Strat­e­gy; the analy­sis to de­vel­op ports and lo­gis­tics hub in the coun­try, specif­i­cal­ly in Port-of-Spain; and the de­vel­op­ment and in­te­gra­tion of the Port Com­mu­ni­ty Sys­tem (PCS) in the ports’ lo­gis­tic chain,” the re­lease stat­ed. Read more here

T&T, BP commit to closer ties

Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley met with energy giant BP’s recently-appointed chief executive officer Bernard Looney yesterday at the company’s headquarters in London. Looney was appointed as CEO last month. He was previously responsible for BP’s upstream business. Read more here

REGIONAL

PAHO launches tool to investigate outbreaks

Go.Data, a platform that facilitates the collection, investigation and visualization of case and contact data during an outbreak, was rolled out on Monday in Mexico by the Pan American Health Organization / World Health Organization (PAHO/WHO), the Global Outbreak Alert and Response Network (GOARN), and the Ministry of Health of Mexico. The tool, which can be utilized by public health professionals involved in outbreak response, allows for the collection of case data, including on laboratory results, hospitalizations and other variables, and enables the control and monitoring of contacts. It also includes a visualization of trains of transmission and the generation of epidemiological curves. Read more here

Tourism Fallout - Sector Forecast To Shed J$76 Billion As ­Coronavirus Causes Plunge In Revenue Projections

The tourism sector, Jamaica’s second-largest earner of foreign exchange, is expected to haemorrhage approximately J$76 billion as government officials cut the forecast for the 2020-2021 fiscal year owing to the severe impact of the dreaded coronavirus, or COVID-19, on travel around the world. Tourism was initially projected to earn US$4.25 billion (J$578 billion) for the upcoming fiscal year. However, the sum has now been reduced to US$3.69 billion (J$502 billion) by the Ministry of Tourism. Edmund Bartlett, the portfolio minister, revealed that the sector was currently growing at a rate of 5.2 per cent since the start of the year. However, the minister told his parliamentary colleagues at yesterday’s sitting of the Standing Finance Committee that he had to revise the projected out-turn to 1.1 per cent when compared with the previous year. Read more here

INTERNATIONAL

Biden's surprise win in Texas caps historic Super Tuesday while Sanders turns to California

A reinvigorated Joe Biden has a nine state Super Tuesday victory haul, capped by topping Sen. Bernie Sanders for an upset victory in Texas after his comeback campaign transformed the Democratic presidential race. Just four days ago, the former vice president's White House hopes were fading fast. Now, he has hugely overperformed expectations on the most critical night of the 2020 race so far and the duel for the nomination is becoming a head-to-head with the democratic socialist from Vermont. Read more here

More than 27,000 'under surveillance' in India

India says it has already screened some 600,000 people for the virus at its air and seaports, and put more than 27,000 people "under surveillance" across the country. Health Minister Harsh Vardhan says India was “the first country in the world to prepare for an outbreak” as it began screening on 17 January, two weeks before the WHO declared an emergency. “India is thoroughly prepared to handle any situation that could emerge,” he said. However, experts say the world’s second most populous country would face considerable challenges if there was an outbreak. Read more here

4th March 2020

Back