Editorial | Towards a sensible conversation on COVID-19

Like others around the world, Jamaica’s Government is struggling with the tensions between its citizens’ fear of the COVID-19 pandemic and its need to keep the country’s fragile economy on an even keel. It isn’t, in this enterprise, as sure-footed as it needs to be.

It hasn’t, it appears to this newspaper, developed a coherent message or communication strategy for the potential crisis, or built a coalition on the issue with its domestic economic partners. These are necessary if the Government is to avoid public panic of the kind which the health minister, Christopher Tufton, sought to tamp down this week, or the skittishness displayed by some tourism interests over the minister’s restrictions on cruise liners coming to Jamaica.

That Jamaicans worry that the coronavirus might reach the island isn’t irrational. It has been the major global focus since its emergence in Wuhan, in China’s southern Hubei province, late last year. Global health officials keep a running daily count of infections and deaths associated with the virus, first, inside China, and now in the more than 80 countries to which it has spread. Without vaccine, it is feared that COVID-19 could develop into a pandemic, with fatality rates similar to, say, Ebola or the influenza outbreak of a century ago.

In this environment, it isn’t surprising that every cough in a hospital or a patient being wheeled into a private screening room is potential grist for the rumour mill. Social media, without the invigilation of the professional press, exacerbates the tittle-tattle. It is against that backdrop, and claims of unreported cases in the island, that Dr Tufton complained that “the spread of incorrect information about the virus is decidedly unhelpful to our response efforts”.

At the same time, the Government has placed travel restrictions on citizens of countries where there have been outbreaks of COVID-19. It also requires cruise ships to adhere to stringent protocols in reporting the nationality of passengers and their state of health with regard to symptoms for COVID-19. These can’t have been easy decisions, with growth in the economy, and with tourism, one of its few healthy drivers, already likely to take a hit from an expected global downturn in travel.

Indeed, the administration has revised its projected growth in visitor arrivals this year, from over five per cent to 1.1 per cent, while the expectation of growth earnings from the industry has been slashed 13 per cent, to US$3.69 billion. It is in these circumstances that some domestic tourism industry players have sided with cruise ship companies, who have warned that they could bypass the island, in calling for softening of the docking requirements.

A government’s first priority, though, must be to keep the country safe, which includes protecting the health and economic well-being of its citizens. Health officials, therefore, have to do what is reasonable and rational to ensure that COVID-19 doesn’t become an unmanageable public health crisis, while being careful not to undermine the economy. That, in a situation such as this one, should begin with a frank discussion between the Government, the private sector, civil society partners and the wider community. The discourse has to be grounded in data and facts.

For instance, only around three per cent of the approximately 95,000 people who had contracted COVID-19 up to Wednesday has died. Eight per cent, who get the infection, is likely to have a mild condition, with the remainder being critical (14 per cent) to severe (five per cent). By contrast, in the United States, during the current flu season, upwards of 32 million people will contract influenza, 310,000 will be hospitalised, and perhaps 18,000 will die.

Fatality rate

Further, based on what we know so far, COVID-19 mostly kills old people. Its potential fatality rate for persons 80 and up is approximately 15 per cent, and eight per cent for those over 70. Thereafter, the rate falls significantly, to around four per cent among the over-60s, and between 0.2 and 0.4 per cent for people in their 30s and 40s. People with underlying conditions, such as cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, chronic respiratory illness and hypertension, are the ones most likely to die.

This information, and any other data that might emerge from the scientific community about the virus, should inform a health campaign, stressing what is already known about preventing its transmission, apart from cutting Jamaica off from the rest of the world – the practice of good personal hygiene, including regular handwashing and covering one’s mouth when coughing. Further, while seeking to prevent the spread of COVID-19, the public health messaging may also have to contemplate a new reality – that like many other viruses and bacteria, we will have to learn to live with, and manage, this one.