Holness says no to tighter curfew hours - ... Unvaccinated public sector workers to be subjected to COVID testing

Tighter curfew hours has joined lockdowns as a COVID-19 containment tool that has been thrown out by the Andrew Holness-led Government, which has insisted that Jamaicans must learn to live with the novel coronavirus.

Nightly curfews now start of 10 and end at five the next morning, while lokdowns were discontinued late last year.

"We must move on with our lives, we must get our economy back on track. We cannot allow ourselves to be defeated by the pandemic. We cannot afford another lockdown; we cannot afford tighter curfew hours. We must learn to live with this virus," Holness said.

The prime minister's comments, which were made in the House of Representatives yesterday, come as Jamaica registered a record high 1,714 cases of COVID-19 on Monday.

Holness told parliamentarians that had it not been for the fact that Jamaica is experiencing a fourth wave of COVID-19, his administration would have further reduced relaxed containment measures that are in place.

The prime minister, however, was clear that implementing lockdowns and tighter curfews are not on the table. He urged Jamaicans to do the "responsible thing" by taking the COVID-19 vaccines that are available in the country and to follow established infection control protocols such as mask-wearing and handwashing.

Holness said that his administration will continue to make the jabs available to persons to protect themselves from COVID-19. He said that "Whether or not they do so is ultimately a matter of personal choice", but was clear that the Government will be implementing measures such as "testing and requiring vaccinations for public sector workers".

Approximately 20 per cent of Jamaica's population has been fully vaccinated, which is way short of the 65 per cent target set by the Government.

The Holness administration has relied on a series of non-clinical methods such as weekend lockdowns, tight curfew hours, community quarantines, gathering limits and bans on entertainment events to help slow the spread of the virus.

The prime minister said that the continuous discovery of new COVID-19 variants confirms that the virus is "here to stay" and that "We, therefore, need to learn to live with COVID-19," he said, adding that the novel coronavirus will be around until at least the medium term.

"I urge all Jamaicans who have not yet done so to get immunised, and I encourage those who are fully vaccinated to take the booster when you are eligible to do so," the prime minister said.