Minister of Tourism the Hon. Carlos James, during a call to the WEFM’s Issues at Hand program, explain just how low vaccination numbers had an adverse effect on a country’s tourism.
“We are having a dilemma where the cruise passengers and the ships have indicated well “we want you to be clear on your protocols, we want to be able to visit as much places as we can in your destination”. We have had the interesting challenge where we have put in place protocols, but there are other countries within in the region who are saying “our vaccine uptake is relatively high, you’re free to come and walk around, you’re coming fully vaccinated. You’re free to come off of the ships and walk around to anywhere”. But in St. Vincent and the Grenadines, we have to be primarily concerned about the health of our local population in terms of enduring we protect them from persons who are coming in and of course persons who are coming, we also protect them from any possible outbreak, to lower the transmission of the COVID-19 virus”. James said.
St. Vincent and the Grenadines vaccination numbers, according to the Ministry of Health’s most recent COVID-19 dashboard, stand at 44,049 total vaccines administered, 26,236 of those being first doses and 17,813 being second doses.
