We are living in uncertain times, described by the World Health Organization as “the defining global health crisis of our time”. Because of this disruptive viral disease, people everywhere have had to make adjustments to their lives as they pay...
The Government will give $9,000 per fortnight to individuals who lose their job due to COVID-19 for a period up to June, but some people are not pleased with the amount being offered. On Tuesday, March 24, 2020, Dr Nigel Clarke, minister of...
Almost every airport in the world is now closed to passenger traffic, and all I can do in these weeks, and maybe months, of self-imposed imprisonment is revel in flights of fancy and indulge in what I call “Plane” English as distinct from “Plain...
AGAINST THE economic uncertainties created by the COVID-19 pandemic, it is understandable that one of Finance Minister Nigel Clarke’s more important pronouncements in his Budget speech last week received almost no notice. He has put aside money for...
LAST MONDAY at the daily Jamaica House press briefing on the state of the COVID-19 pandemic in Jamaica, it was revealed that since the outbreak Jamaica has conducted only 89 tests, with 21 positives. Government policy is to test only those who are...
The COVID-19 crisis is an exceptionally serious threat, but the underlying trend is even more serious. The number and diversity of disease outbreaks has increased significantly since 1980, and most of these new outbreaks were caused by zoonotic...
The Government’s restriction on the movement of elderly people, to slow the rate of infection by COVID-19 among Jamaica’s most vulnerable demographic, is logical, but demands more for the strategy to be really efficacious. The Government must now...
I AM impressed by the measures that have been put in place by the executive arm of government and the judiciary, led by our proactive chief justice, to address the COVID-19 pandemic. However, your article in the Gleaner of March 23, 2020, in...
COVID-19 IS upon us, globally and here on the Rock. Worldwide, indications suggest that with the current rate of spread, the likely infection levels will be staggering, as too will be the effects on the global economy. Against such ominous...
LAST WEEK, on TVJ’s Smile Jamaica, a young lady was giving tips about homeschooling during the coronavirus (COVID-19) crisis. She encouraged both parents at home to be involved and use a digital platform. Obviously, this lady does not realise that...
At the start of the year, the Inter-American Development (IDB) projected that Caribbean economies, excluding Guyana with its oil boom, would grow, on average, by 1.5 per cent, or half a point slower than in 2019. But the IDB had a proviso: the...
In an online search, I happened to find a Jamaica Information Service report informing that the Senate, on January 23, passed the Patents and Designs Bill. The passage of this important legislation seems to have attracted little attention. This...
One of the topical debates in the fight against the COVID-19 disease in Jamaica is the matter of state quarantine as opposed to home quarantine. There are many reasons for having home quarantine, and in an ordered and orderly society, it can work,...
FACED WITH a major global peril, the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean missed an opportunity to strengthen their capacity to create a common front against this and other crises. They re-elected Luis Almagro as secretary general of the...
IF WE are to believe the scientists and the history books, eons ago, Mother Earth was as supple and radiant as baroque depictions of a virginal Mary. Terrestrial greens harmoniously fought in equal measure with crystal waters for supremacy. The...
WITH FLU, it usually takes about three days from infection to becoming ill. With COVID-19, it averages five or six days, but it can be up to two weeks, and some people who get the virus don’t develop any symptoms. About 80 per cent of those...
IT IS not clear whether Parliament’s Human Resources and Social Development Committee, which hasn’t had a sitting in recent months, has concluded its hearings on reforming the abortion law and, if it has, what it has recommended to legislators. Its...
Whenever I’m going through extremely difficult physical and/or emotional times, I focus on the ‘afterwards’. I put my thoughts on what happens after the pain and suffering. Given our current situation, I find myself thinking about life after COVID-...
The COVID-19 global pandemic is going to trigger a major global recession. While Caribbean countries are not yet at the epicentre of the pandemic, as the global travel and tourism industry faces a sudden stop, their travel and tourism and...
As COVID-19, caused by the virus SARS-CoV-2, a coronavirus, spreads across the world, many questions are being asked. One of the most commonly asked is: “How long can the virus survive outside the human body?” The new coronavirus typically spreads...
I USED to rail against Wilmot Perkins’ sneering disrespect for the political culture and what he saw as its regular excrescence of cruel, discriminatory, corrupt charade of governance. I now know that although many politicians have a sincere...
Carolyn Cooper CHAKA-CHAKA SPELLING A ongle when politician a look vote dem know how fi chat fi wi Jamaican language. Eena dis ya virus attaclaps, di Prime Minister an all a di odder govament minister dem supposen fi a gi out warning eena two...
Life won’t quite be the same after this coronavirus pandemic. As the gloom of social isolation and quarantine descends, we need to think carefully about its impact on our domestic lives, employment, and so on. Another time, we can look at how it is...
Increasing numbers of ‘non-essential’ workers are either working from home, have reduced working hours, or are being laid off. Production will decline, foreign exchange earnings will fall, family incomes will shrink, food and other basket of goods...
I am responding to The Gleaner’s article “Clarke chided for undercutting budget rules”, which appeared on Wednesday, March 18, and which provides excerpts from Dr Peter Phillips’ speech in his Budget Debate presentation. The one-sidedness of Dr...
