— Private Sector Commission urges

AS Guyana’s coronavirus cases continues to climb, the Private Sector Commission (PSC) has issued a strong statement calling for its member companies to require vaccination of its employees.
“The Private Sector Commission embraces and recommends that its member companies require that all those of its employees who refuse to be vaccinated must provide evidence of a medically- current COVID-19 negative test from infection before reporting to work, while continuing to encourage all of its employees to become vaccinated,” the statement read.
Further, the PSC urged that the government makes it mandatory for all medical and security personnel in frontline contact with other persons to either be vaccinated or provide evidence of a medically-current COVID-19 negative test. “… and that all places providing hospitality and entertainment services, including restaurants, require evidence of either vaccination or a medically-current COVID-19 negative test from its customers in order for them to receive service,” the PSC added.

The grouping of reputable businesses premised its call on the “growing cases of COVID-19 infections and deaths, all of which involve persons who are not fully vaccinated”.
The PSC also lauded the government’s “sterling efforts to obtain vaccinations for our people in an effort to achieve herd immunity for the nation”.
As it is, Guyana is one of the very few countries that have managed to secure enough vaccines to inoculate its entire adult population. Notwithstanding this feat, there are sections of Guyanese who remain reluctant to take the vaccines.
Also putting a bit of a damper on the government’s intense vaccination programme, were utterances by members of the opposition, including the Opposition Leader himself, Joseph Harmon.
After becoming fully vaccinated with the Sputnik V vaccine from Russia, Harmon had called for a suspension of the administering of the vaccine, claiming it to be fake. Those claims were later put to rest following an official response from the vaccine’s manufacturer, detailing the details of the jabs supplied to Guyana. However, as was recognised by former Speaker of the National Assembly, Ralph Ramkarran, “The harm of vaccine politics will be incalculable.”

INCALCULABLE

The attorney-at-law had reasoned that “Those reluctant Guyanese who were persuaded to enter the vaccine compound will rush out and those who could have been persuaded to do so, will remain outside, watching the sparks fly.” In cementing its call for more stringent efforts to promote vaccination, the PSC pointed to the measures being taken by countries such as France and Belize, which have determined that “Those who refuse to be vaccinated are putting the rest of the population at risk.”
Moreover, the PSC said that it endorses the position taken by the Adviser to the Minister of Health, Dr. Leslie Ramsammy, who maintained that “if you want to exercise a right to not take the vaccine [then] you must be prepared to face the consequences”. Dr. Ramsammy, a medical practitioner and a former Health Minister, had indicated that “while someone has the right to refuse the vaccine, those persons do not have a right to expose the rest of us to their reckless risks.”

The Commission said too that it has also taken note of the fact that there is extensive and growing judicial opinion within the Caribbean and the international community that “individual rights do not override the collective right of the community when the community as a whole is threatened”.
Ever since the coronavirus began its global rampage in 2020, the vaccines have been hailed as the only means by which the world can exit the current pandemic which has taken millions of lives, and continues to threaten the lives of those who have not been vaccinated.
Although the vaccines do not guard against the virus in its entirety, it provides enough antibodies to guard against severe symptoms and death. In Guyana, no vaccinated persons have been hospitalised or have died due to the virus. The country’s death toll currently stands at 512, and fortunately, counting.

READY AND WILLING

In light of the deadly effects of not being vaccinated, the Private Sector Commission said that it is “ready and willing to support all and any action taken by our government that will serve to protect our population from the surge of this pandemic, inclusive of a comprehensive policy to be ‘gazetted’, which will ensure that vaccinated citizens are protected against exposure from those who exercise the freedom to refuse to be vaccinated”.
Although the Guyana government has not introduced any strict measures to push vaccination, it continues to ramp up its vaccination capacity. Efforts have also been made to extend vaccination hours well into the nights.
Health Minister, Dr. Frank Anthony had also encouraged Guyanese to take the vaccines now, since possibility exists that it could possibly become a costly commodity, due to its demand and proven efficacy. So far, Guyana has been administering the Sputnik V vaccine, Sinopharm, the AstraZeneca. The People’s Progressive Party Civic government is also working assiduously to secure the United States’ Pfizer vaccine, which is the only one approved for children. President Dr. Irfaan Ali had assured that once Guyana is able to secure such vaccines, immunising the country’s children will be priority.