St Kitts and Nevis eliminates 24-hour lockdown

St Kitts and Nevis: Prime Minister of St Kitts and Nevis Dr. Timothy Harris, during his National address, announced that 24-hour lockdown has been removed, and some elements of normalcy set to return next week though a nightly curfew remains in place.

Prime Minister said the county can now reposition on a path to a full restoration of normalcy.

He announced new measures that will see a reopening of the economy in a phased and safe manner and under strict COVID-19 protocols.

Notably, New rules he said will take effect from Monday for the next 14 days.

Among the new rules is the removal of a 24-hour lockdown. A night curfew will remain in place, however, but will now be imposed from 9 pm to 5 am daily.

Dr Harris said all persons employed by the public service, statutory bodies and state own cooperations should resume work and that businesses shall return to normal working hours subject to curfew hours.

He, however, indicated that all vendors are to remain in the public market and passenger buses will be allowed a maximum of 10 passengers.

Inter-island travel is also set to resume while churches, nurseries, day cares, can operate.

Sporting events are allowed, and beaches will be opened for exercise.

The prime minister announced that quarantine for fully vaccinated passengers would be reduced to 3 days, and children will be treated the same once with a fully vaccinated adult.

Quarantine remain the same for unvaccinated travellers.

Also, The Ministry of Health’s Situation Reports for the past four days have recorded a total of 10 new COVID-19 positive cases. On Tuesday 6th July, two (2) were recorded; Wednesday 7th July, two (2); Thursday, 8th July, one (1); and Friday 9th July, five (5).

This is good news since May 19, when the country entered into community spread with its 46th positive case. Since then, the Lambda strain of the virus which was identified has spread like wildfire in communities resulting in 480 new positive cases in just seven weeks. However, 332 of those cases have recovered, resulting in a 69 % recovery rate of new cases in less than two months.

The Ministry of Health’s robust contact tracing remains to identify new cases of COVID-19, and testing has been continuous.

St. Kitts & Nevis COVID-19 Situation Report No. 470 as of Friday, July 09, 2021, notes that the total number of confirmed COVID-19 cases now stands at 525 with 145 active cases, and 377 recovered cases. Five hundred seven of those cases were recorded in St. Kitts, while 18 were registered in Nevis. To date, there have been 22, 045 negative results.