COVID-19 demagogues

 The PLP is all about being the shameless demagogues of the COVID-19 war in The Bahamas

By Dennis Dames

I have read and taken note of the PLP’s press release of July 28, 2021 – addressing their official opposition position on COVID-19 in The Bahamas.

The party leader, the Hon. Philip Brave Davis outlined about nine points to forward us out of this emergency. I want to talk about item number five which reads: “Fifth, we need a dramatic expansion of testing and contact tracing. Positivity rates consistently over 20 percent are evidence we are not testing enough. When Family Islands with relatively small populations like Cat Island and Andros have cases, let’s test our way out of the outbreak, instead of locking everyone down. That has proven too damaging to our families and businesses.”

What’s the point of more testing if no plan is in place to effectively quarantine the resulting positive cases? We live in a country where the majority of us reside in modest dwellings with other people, and in a lot of situations we dwell with an extensive extended family. So, where do we go to isolate until we get the all-clear to enter society again? Most of us don’t have the means to effectually quarantine, so who is going to pick up the tab?

Additionally, scientists have told us that COVID-19 – like the flu, is here to stay. So, why does the PLP believe that we can test our way out of this global pandemic? The dramatic expansion of COVID-19 testing and contact tracing is like expanding a wild goose chase in an arena where the majority of people are unvaccinated.

Yes, the vaccinated and unvaccinated are catching COVID-19. It’s unstoppable just now. The only difference is, that the unvaccinated are feeling the brunt of hospitalizations and deaths from COVID-19. So, to propose more testing and contact tracing, does not address the big issue at hand, which is increasing hospitalizations and deaths, especially among the unvaccinated.

The PLP has accepted that most COVID transmissions happen indoors. They stated the following in their release: “Beyond vaccines, there are ways to reduce the risk of contracting COVID, and we need to share, in detail, these risk mitigation strategies with Bahamians. For example, this is largely an airborne virus, and most transmission happens indoors. We’d like to see a public-private initiative to provide guidance and support for improving ventilation and air quality in workplaces, churches, homes and schools.”

The only way to reduce the risk of catching COVID is to stay exclusively to one’s self, in my view. That’s almost impossible with the typical Bahamian, or human generally.

We have to live with COVID-19, but we don’t necessarily have to die from it. Vaccination is our most important partner and tool in the COVID-19 fight right now.

The PLP hasn’t accepted that fact and reality as yet because it doesn’t fit in to their election campaign plans, in my humble viewpoint.

For the PLP, it’s all about being the shameless demagogues of the COVID-19 war in The Bahamas.

July 28, 2021

PLP Demagoguery on CoViD-19 Vaccination in The Bahamas

 The Official Opposition PLP is ready and prepared to win by hook or crook

By Dennis Dames

The leader of the PLP, the Hon. Philip Brave, stated the following among other crazy things in a recent PLP press release: “The PLP’s COVID Task Force continues to promote constructive policy solutions, including a dramatic expansion of testing, more effective masks, a real public education campaign, and close consultation with local medical professionals.”

What about the promotion of national unity and resolve in the COVID-19 war, Mr. Davis? What is the PLP’s COVID Task Force relationship like with the present regime, and other community stake holders?

Where is the PLP’s “get vaccinated” campaign and leadership when the nation really needs them, Mr. Davis? Where is the vital unified political partnership and guidance in The Bahamas when we truly could use them right now, Mr. Davis?

According to Mr. Davis and his PLP: The governing FNM is stupid and inept and the PLP has all the right answers to deal with the onslaught of COVID-19 in our society.

The PLP leader stated further that: “The new Emergency Orders restricting campaigning infringe fundamental free speech rights of Bahamians and are further evidence that the government does not believe it can win a fair fight.”

Mr. Davis’ primary focus and concern seems to be on the next general election. They are ready and prepared to win by hook or crook. Rocking the unvaccinated boat doesn’t fit into their strategy and plan – in my humble opinion.

Do not hide behind, “…close consultation with local medical professionals”, Mr. Davis. Ultimately, the political decisions will prevail in our COVID-19 environment and economy. You and the PLP don’t seem to be up to the challenge of leadership in The Bahamas in this perilous COVID 19 battle.

As long as we are mixing and mingling, COVID-19 will spread more, Mr. Davis. So long as we welcome visitors to our shores, COVID-19 will remain alive and well among us, Mr. Davis.

If we encourage our campaign workers to be careless about vaccination and the COVID protocols, and more concerned about campaigning, COVID-19 would continue to rage on in our communities, Mr. Davis and the PLP.

If the majority of us remain unvaccinated in the face of a very fluid and deadly virus, we could really end up on some painfully undesired tracks, Mr. Davis. Not even you and your party will want to preside over such a failed state. So, let’s therefore promote together: Get vaccinated, Mr. Davis and the PLP.

Prime Minister Dr. Hubert Minnis, who must be the monster in your dreams, has already said over and over again that vaccination is the only way out of our COVID-19 crisis in The Bahamas and the wider world.

If you agree with that, I invite you to show some genuine leadership and join Minnis and his FNM government in getting those wise and prudent words out. Anything short of that is considered pure demagoguery, in my opinion, Mr. Davis.

Show some true leadership, Mr. Davis, and implement a PLP policy – which requires every PLP campaigner and poll worker to be fully vaccinated against COVID-19 in the interest of the health and wellbeing of our country, The Bahamas.

I’m going to use my fundamental free speech rights to say: Keep your unvaccinated PLP agents to yourself and your PLP party.

It really looks like Brave Davis and the PLP feel that they could win the next government via a campaign by and for the unvaccinated using fundamental free speech rights as a front. The devil is a liar.

Get Vaccinated Bahamas

By Dennis Dames

Get vaccinated soon.

The potentially crippling and lethal Corona Virus is fluid, dynamic, deadly and dangerously potent – and it rages on in many quarters of the universe.  We hear about vaccines, and new variants of the disease regularly, and it appears that no one really knows how to control the contagious and rapidly mutating CoViD-19.

Politicians are doing their best to paint a promising picture for the people with their respective get-vaccinated campaigns.  It’s a noble initiative, but a vaccinated person can still catch CoViD – and possibly die of related complications.  The only difference is that the science says that a vaccinated person has a significantly less chance of hospitalization, and death if they catch CoViD19.

It’s a catch-22 situation.  We have to live and die with the contagion in a rebellious culture – where people ignore the standard protocols of social distancing, mask wearing, hand washing and sanitizing and so on; and they are intensely skeptical about the various vaccines.

I bit the bullet one day in May, and proceeded to get my first jab.  I was fortunate enough to be served without an appointment.  There was only an elderly couple before me, who were there for their second shot.

I am relieved that I had made the decision to get vaccinated in an atmosphere dominated by the good, bad and ugly reports of CoViD-19’s impact in our world, and the dreaded vaccines.  I advise my fellow Bahamian brothers and sisters who have not taken the first step yet to get vaccinated against CoViD19 – to bite the bullet and get on with it.

WE ARE NOW IN A RACE OF VACCINES VERSUS VARIANTS

Covid-19: A RACE OF VACCINES VERSUS VARIANTS:

By Gilbert Morris:

Some countries praising themselves on Covid 19 performance have done nothing more than stumbled through the pandemic, without the slightest clue as to why they did not suffer devastation. And though they have no history of managerial competence, still they gloat and politicise their accidental escape from the worst outcomes, so far.

This is unfortunate because, the history of science and society shows us that crisis are moments for scripted innovation, by which nations - if well governed - advance beyond the crisis in other areas.

That is NEVER accidental. Its always intentional.

But there is another issue: the same slipshod attitude iced with hubris that either politicises performance in crisis or exploits accidental escapes from tragedy, sets up countries for greater tragedy.

A good but sad example is our Jamaican brothers and sisters: It's only recently that government officials and their supporters were gloating about how they “beat the pandemic”. Under this delusion, they “opened up” as if their claims of competence could defeat the REALITY of a pandemic.

Now REALITY HAS BITTEN: they are under curfews and lockdowns together with other extreme measures, with a meagre supply of vaccines that does not cover even 10% of their population. Even without adding the terrifying risk of the British, Brazilian or South African variants arriving in our region - for which we have zero strategies - the hubristic attitude means a country is FAILING TO GRASP the nature of pandemics or the first, second and third order social and economic effects, which are already silently underway, that could cripple a country even where it manages some success.

Whilst Cayman Islands, Taiwan, Singapore, New Zealand, St Kitts-Nevis and South Korea have been the best performers, Jamaica is not the only country in which early gloating has given way to deathly realities: the UK, Brazil, France, Sweden, the United States and others are facing these headwinds, but more importantly, it is necessary for countries to come to grips with a brutal fact or which I warned several months ago.

The testing phase of this pandemic exposed general incompetence and even idiocy on the parts of many governments; not to mention a failure of basic arithmetic; witnessed in a host of bogus national dashboards. I warned further that the vaccine is NOT a panacea and that in the nature of pandemics, there is NEVER a clear path to normalcy.

IN THIS CASE, WE ARE NOW IN A RACE OF VACCINES VERSUS VARIANTS; which means, everything we have done and are doing may - in an instant - become obsolete; particularly for example, if the variant strains of Covid 19 in the US overwhelms public health management, forcing drastic measures. This should impose a sense of urgency in the Caribbean in particular to cultivate development of first case, best case and worst case scenarios.

It hasn’t!

Part of the problem is as I explained above: the testing phase one year ago, should have schooled nations on system, logistics and publish health management failures, the knowledge of which should have inform this emerging ‘vaccine phase”. I argued in the “SpaceNex Global Roundtable lectures” in January 2021, that CARICOM nations for instance, in our failure to coordinate at the upstream of vaccine development one year ago (as I advised then), has limited our access to vaccines now and reduced us to our usual begging status.

Now, having failed ourselves in those particulars, we are faced, not only with limited vaccines, but our failure to cultivate a deployment and logistics model or to establish scientific Post Vaccine Review Consortia exposes us to multiplier problems, which it is our routine to ignore until its too late; particularly in circumstances where vaccine deployment requires a chain of competence in management for which we have zero examples in our history of governance.

This hold’s true, especially with the Pfizer vaccine. This vaccine requires exacting clinical and logistical expertise to administer properly. For example, once a nurse removes a vial from the -80° Celsius freezer, it requires defrosting, being shaken 10 times, then an additive injected, then shaken again 10 times, then a filling of syringes, and hopefully patients ready and waiting. Once the vaccine is thawed and prepared, staff have only 6 hours to administer the vaccine.

The shot is short, but after vaccination, a patient is required to remain for 15 minutes for their safety with a nurse to observe and ask whether the patient feels light-headed or any adverse reactions. And after all that, one needs to walk away with a date for the second shot, and a card, documenting vaccination type and date...and repeat the entire process again!

Nothing above addresses directly the underlying economic bruising citizens are suffering. Political types will say its because of the pandemic.

However, the larger portion of the misery citizens have suffered is because of poor decisions or non-decisions of their governments. This is particularly true in the Caribbean when compared with the mastery of Cayman-Singapore in particular - which involved Covid 19 management plus economic repositioning and structural reforms or the St. Kitts-Nevis, Canada New Zealand model, which was closed border Covid management.

In recent advice to agencies, institutions, companies and governments, I was asked what has been the hardest message to get across?

It has been these:

a. That no nation is “qualified to manage a pandemic”. The US was rated in 2019 as “best prepared of all nations” to manage a pandemic. That was clearly abjectly FALSE!

b. The nations that performed best were not better qualified. Rather, they had better leadership, decision models, transparency and because of that, public trust, through which they both managed their resources effectively and appealed to their populations convincingly.

c. It is foolish to gloat about any momentary accidental “successes” in a pandemic, because biological morphology is fractal: you can’t see or know all that’s going on and every perceived “success” may ignite a tragic catastrophic cascading failures.

d. Therefore, self-satisfied, “soul take thine ease” approaches, lack of urgency and failure to see today’s initiatives as BETA-testing options for tomorrow’s strategies (or failure to strategise reforms and economic repositioning) will grind nations down to the levels of their ignorance and incompetence, because pandemics FORCE societies to their true levels, and it is in the nature of pandemics that they shift SUDDENLY all alignments of expected normalcy.

Source/Comment

Covid-19 Madness in The Bahamas

By Dennis Dames:

So, we are on lockdown until September 30, 2020. Let’s pray that everything works out by then. We are really a lockdown-weary people right now. Life cannot continue on this road beyond September – in my opinion.

One of the dirty secrets about COVID-19 in our country, is an ill-prepared and Ill-equipped healthcare infrastructure. We did not reach here in 2017. We know that our healthcare system is in critical condition, and we knew it for decades now.

It looks like many of us will die, or become wounded from COVID-19 for life. Thanks to a half century of inept, incompetent and plain old visionless black governance.

So, if things do not improve on the Corona Virus front by September 30, 2020 – we will have lots more weeping and wailing to do for our love ones and country, as life must go on – for all that it’s worth.

The first order of business should be to: Break the culture of the pervasive government dependency in The Bahamas, and move full steam ahead with the implementation of local government on New Providence Island. There is an unacceptable and unsustainable level of dependency on the national government – by the people; even in the good times.

Next, let move to build a healthcare system that’s wholly wholesome for our people and nation; but progressive vision will be required.

That’s where 2022 come in folks. Let’s get to know every Tom, Dick, and Harry; and Mary, Sue and Jane – and all the others who will come our way to seek the majority support. Let’s ask them about their plans to fix our healthcare system. Let’s ask them about their vision for local government on New Providence Island. Let’s ask them about their plans to correct the unproductive culture of government dependency.

Yes, let’s ask them about their national vision for the country. It cannot be just tax, borrow and spend – as usual. It cannot be a broken centralized bureaucracy for five more years. It simply cannot be the same old-same old political jive and madness, like locking-down the country in hopes that the Corona Virus disappears by the end of the lockdown period.

God knows it.