Trinidad & Tobago PM announces lifting of most COVID-19 restrictions

Trinidad & Tobago’s Prime Minister Keith Rowley has announced the removal of most of the restrictions that were implemented due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Speaking during a news conference, Rowley said the restrictions to be lifted include the re­moval of the Safe Zone sys­tem as of April 4 and a change in the re­quirement of PCR tests to en­ter the twin-island republic to Anti­gen tests, effective Sunday.

The prime minister also announced the removal of all re­stric­tions re­gard­ing rivers and beach­es and the removal of limits to pub­lic gath­er­ings. These restrictions will also be lifted on April 4.

Concerning gatherings such as public fetes, Rowley said that people will be asked to exercise control.

“We are not telling you don’t par­ty, don’t have a beer, don’t go to a bar – the gov­ern­ment is no longer telling you what to do,” Row­ley said.

Concerning the re­quire­ment to wear masks in pub­lic spaces – he said this will remain in place ex­cept in sport­ing ac­tiv­i­ties.

Rowley also warned that the coun­try was not yet fully at a place where life could con­tin­ue with­out cau­tion.

“We in Trinidad & Tobago can say that our sit­u­a­tion has con­sid­er­ably im­proved but we cannot say that the pan­dem­ic is over,” he said.

The prime min­is­ter thanked all mem­bers of the health sec­tor, say­ing they rose to the chal­lenge in deal­ing with the ef­fects of the pan­dem­ic.

He said the ex­perts who looked in­to the health sec­tor found noth­ing to sup­port po­lit­i­cal and oth­er claims that the loss of life was due to the clin­i­cal man­age­ment of pa­tients at the hos­pi­tals.

“There was ab­solute­ly no short­com­ing of those who com­mit­ted them­selves to the Hip­po­crat­ic oath,” he said. – (CMC)