Sir James says people who refuse to take vaccine have ‘a selfish attitude’

This country will continue to be impacted by COVID19 regardless of whether there is a change of government in St Vincent and the Grenadines (SVG).

Former Prime Minister Sir James Mitchell made this clear last Wednesday during VC3’s Round Table Talk, where he commented on the current political climate in the country.

“But what I find though; it is amazing in St Vincent and the Grenadines that people actually working in the tourist industry don’t care about the businesses. They have a selfish attitude about themselves, I’m talking about the people who don’t want to get vaccinated,” Sir James said. “And of course, there are people who have fixed salaries and are quite happy to draw their salary but they are not concerned about the economy and they don’t want to accept that COVID is killing St Vincent and the Grenadines and other parts of the world.”

Protests have been ongoing mainly in Kingstown in opposition to a number of issues. Recent demonstrations, particularly on August 5, saw a large crowd on the streets of the capital standing against an amendment to the Public Health Act which mandates vaccination for front-line workers.

The New Democratic Party (NDP) has also been part of these protests and opposition leader, Dr Godwin Friday has said publicly that his party’s goal is for fresh elections to be held.

“So, there are a lot of unfortunate misunderstandings that we have to clear up and St Vincent is at the bottom of the pile with regard to being vaccinated and we have to get it done. “This matter is not political because if even the government changes, COVID is not going away. That’s the way I see it so we have to work together to beat this COVID,” said the founder of the New Democratic Party.

The former Prime Minister said there are a lot of unfortunate misunderstandings that must be cleared up regarding the vaccination.

“Could those who say they don’t want to get vaccinated, I ask them, if they care about the economy. And what impact it has on you and what impact it has on the poor people in the country…when you say you don’t want to get vaccinated, you are hurting the rest of the society,” he said.

Sir James has been very supportive of vaccination as being an efficient way for countries to kick-start their economies and return to normalcy.

He acknowledged the rising number of deaths from COVID-19 being recorded in the region in recent times. The former prime minister added that SVG was lucky to have recorded only 12 deaths so far and that people need to understand that COVID is not going away.