What social distancing? - Inner-city residents say harsh living conditions rule out such measures
Published:Sunday | April 12, 2020 | 12:00 AMCorey Robinson - Senior Staff Reporter
Government is stressing social distancing as one of the main practices to counter the spread of the dreaded COVID-19 in Jamaica. But for residents of several of the Corporate Area’s toughest inner-communities, such a practice falls short of wishful thinking.
Tenement and ‘big yard’ settings, poor housing conditions in enclaves where neighbours squeeze past each other in tight hallways, several persons living in small spaces, multiple family members sleeping in one room, and limited bathroom and washing facilities that are shared by some 20 persons at a time make social distancing impossible, they say.
The residents’ sentiments followed a risk-analysis study commissioned by Cabinet last month, which found that more than 40 communities in the Kingston Metropolitan Area are the most at-risk places in Jamaica for transmission of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19).
Spanish Town, Port Antonio and Montego Bay were also featured in the top 50 hotspots for the spread of the deadly disease. Westmoreland and St Elizabeth accounted for several ‘warm’ spots for COVID-19 community outbreak, even as Jamaica now grapples with 65 confirmed cases.
“Twenty people live inna my yard and nine people inna the house. So me feel that social distance kinda hard for we,” argued Danville Hamilton, who was among a group of youngsters hanging out on a corner in ‘Southside’, a hard-pressed community in central Kingston, last week.
“Is one pipe, one cestant (cistern) and everybody come and wash dem pot one place. If you go fi use the bathroom you have to wait on somebody so you have to socialise. Because if somebody deh a di pipe, yuh can’t stay three feet away from dem while yuh wait. So really, nuh social distance nuh deh desuh,” he surmised.
NOT UPTOWN
Hamilton explained to The Sunday Gleaner that in Southside, a single room is sometimes shared by up to five persons after it is divided with ply, dry wall or curtains. There is little privacy for anyone, and at nights, common spaces like living rooms, halls and verandas are converted into sleeping quarters for many.
Making it to the bathroom, his friends explained, includes stepping over others, especially children who, in most cases, share beds or sponges on the floors with each other.
“There is a lot of people living in yards with 14 or 15 people and they are around each other every day,” stressed Tivin James, explaining the subculture and living conditions of inner-city communities versus ‘uptown’.
So severe are the living conditions in Bowerbank, a seemingly forgotten inner-city community off Windward Road in east Kingston, that residents there believe they would be doomed if one of them should catch the deadly coronavirus. There is no space for isolation if someone gets sick, they said.
“Listen, the most we can do is try don’t catch it. Because, you see if one person in here catch it, the whole a we catch it!” stressed Christopher Roberts.
“We don’t have nuh space, we clustered and we can’t separate. Is one straight yard with all four family inna it. We use one bathroom, we use one toilet.”
No Proper Housing
Noting that there are many seniors in the enclave, he said for decades governments have ignored pleas for proper houses in the community.
“All we have to do is just keep we self clean, follow the people dem (health ministry) advice, listen what they say and try to work with it. Only that we can do,” Roberts stated.
Fisherman Ronald Clarke took The Sunday Gleaner on a tour through meandering tracks of dirt and zinc fences that branched off into tiny hovels in Bowerbank.
Men, women, children and their pets squeezed through the narrow pathways dotted with clothing lines and illegal electric connections.
Accepting that it is too late for proper housing to protect them from an outbreak of COVID-19, they are pleading for cleaning supplies from the authorities to help with sanitisation.
On the team’s visit to a decrepit two-storey tenement in ‘Backbush’ in Mountain View, St Andrew, occupants tried their best to maintain their distance and keep the spaces clean. That was particularly difficult, however, in a small building said to house some 59 adults and children.
“Right now, me quarantine myself in and me radio stuck pon ZIP,” laughed Omar, otherwise called the ‘OK Boss’, a resident of the building.
“But you have to keep your place clean. You have to keep your surrounding clean, and you have to listen. You can’t be penny wise and pound foolish. You have to just follow the procedure (warnings) and be strong in order to cope.”
Omar explained that he was particularly close to his next-door neighbour, and that even though they still chat from time to time, they have been serious about maintaining their distance.
One female resident gingerly squeezed past him as she made her way up a set of stairs to her quarters.
In South St Andrew, residents of Majesty Gardens laughed at queries about social distancing. For many in bottom ‘Back-To’, such concepts are as luxurious and unattainable as the benefit of an indoor toilet.
“Nuh social distance nuh deh dung here suh. Look, yuh nuh see people all over di place pon di corner dem?” one woman pointed out to The Sunday Gleaner.
A group of women said they were more concerned about the implications of social distancing on their ability to gamble in the area. “The police and soldiers will overlook we gambling but them seh no more than 10 people not to deh round the table. So we just affi work with dem,” explained one woman, who added that those who can afford hand sanitisers buy them.