Like many Caribbean islands, St Lucia, St Vincent and Barbados have all seen an exponential increase in the number of confirmed novel coronavirus (COVID-19) cases since the start of the year.

What’s most concerning about the spike in these three countries, is the insistence by government officials that community spread ‘hasn’t returned’, despite evidence to the contrary.

All three islands are running a dangerous, borderline reckless campaign of half-truths in the ill-advised aim of allaying mass panic.

St Vincent and the Grenadines

The Ralph Gonsalves-led administration is yet to acknowledge community spread in St Vincent, even as the Ministry of Health has 515 cases posted as “under investigation”.

How is it that you conduct 24,866 COVID tests to date—with only 134 imported cases as well as six so-categorised as import-related—and not see a greater problem with a national caseload of 655?

Bearing in mind that St Vincent currently sees a total of 531 active cases, is that not indicative of community spread?

As at 6:00 pm Wednesday, January 20, St Vincent had confirmed 53 new cases of COVID-19, a meagre two being the only imported instances, yet no recognition of a widespread outbreak, outside of naming clusters.

“All the other [active] cases are of nationals detected during contact tracing, testing at flu clinics and targeted screening. There are now 515 local cases of COVID-19, the majority of whom are linked to various clusters,” the ministry of health indicated in a statement.

There are merits to declaring community spread, as it would help to communicate the gravity of the Vincentian situation to a population that for all intents largely ignores the prevention protocols.

It’s time to wise up, St Vincent. There is a lot riding on you getting it right. If current rates of coronavirus infection continue for the next week, then one in every 100 Vincentians would have contracted the illness in less than two months.

Community. Spread. Has. Returned.

Barbabos

Barbados also falls woefully short in this regard, against the towering data.

When Prime Minister Mia Mottley’s government declared a return to the nightly curfews on New Year’s Day, very few had any idea of the magnitude of the outbreak the island was about to face.

Back then, Barbados was managing 383 cases in total. Three weeks into the new year and that caseload has skyrocketed to 1,156—a more than 200 per cent increase.

Health and Wellness Minister Jeffery Bostic has maintained that Barbados has the current spike under control, despite the Best-dos Santos Laboratory coming under strain as it struggled to meet the testing demands.

The backlog was so severe that the government announced refunds for persons who visited Barbados and spent their vacation days in quarantine without receiving their COVID-19 results.

I understand that declaring community spread comes with its own precipitous implications as the tourism-dependent Caribbean seeks to collectively jumpstart economic recovery… but, especially in a pandemic, there is a fine line between PR and information suppression.

St Lucia

St Lucia, once a shining star in the COVID-19 response, and the last of the three, stands accused of high crimes in the court of public opinion.

Imagine having declared oneself ‘coronavirus-free’ – not once but twice – just for those gains to be wiped from record with a disastrous outbreak to start 2021?

The picturesque island ended 2020 in a spot of bother, recording 11 new cases in the last 48 hours of the year. Sadly, that was only the tip of the proverbial iceberg.

St Lucia, within the first three weeks of January, has gone from 353 overall cases to 755 today—leaving the island worse off than when it managed 62 active cases. The Allen Chastanet-led administration now handles 331 active cases, a 433 per cent increase.

Like their Caribbean neighbours, St Lucian officials have refused to even entertain the possibility of community spread. Ironically, these same officials beamed with pride when it was determined there was limited risk of an outbreak on the resumption of face-to-face learning in mid-January.

Now, as the government is forced to eat its words, St Lucia has discontinued classes and re-instituted nightly curfews. The island has even gone as far as to enter the age of prohibition, banning alcohol sale and yet, there is no community spread.

That, and explictly restricting ALL social gathering as well as work-from-home recommendations for companies and their staff.

The facts speak for themselves, however, I will rest my case with an old but poignant verse from the book of Proverbs.

“Speak the truth, speak it ever, cause it what it will, he who hides the wrong he does, does the wrong thing still.”