{"id":129902,"date":"2021-05-31T09:26:34","date_gmt":"2021-05-31T13:26:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/antiguanewsroom.com\/?p=129902"},"modified":"2021-05-31T09:30:03","modified_gmt":"2021-05-31T13:30:03","slug":"government-to-discuss-firm-date-for-reopening-antigua-and-barbuda","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/antiguanewsroom.com\/government-to-discuss-firm-date-for-reopening-antigua-and-barbuda\/","title":{"rendered":"Government to discuss firm date for reopening Antigua and Barbuda"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Prime Minister Gaston Browne said his government would eventually remove all the restrictions in place to prevent the spread of the coronavirus in Antigua and Barbuda.<\/p>

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\u201cAt some point, we will have to open up the country\u2019s economy, we\u2019ll have to do away with all of the regulations, the curfew and, you know, other things that we have in place. We would have to fully open up the country at some point,\u201d he told Pointe FM on Saturday.<\/p>

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The Prime Minister said if people allow themselves to \u201cbecome more vulnerable and you do not get vaccinated and let\u2019s say we open up the country later in the year and you\u2019re not vaccinated, then you\u2019re running the risk of contracting the disease and potentially getting hospitalized or you can actually die.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\u201cNow, at that time, I don\u2019t know anyone can fault the government because on a weekly basis for several months, we\u2019ve been asking people to go out there and, on a daily basis for that matter, to go out there and to get vaccinated,\u201d he insisted.<\/p>\n

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\u201cI just wanna signal here, I will have a further discussion on this maybe in the next couple of weeks that at some point a firm date has to be set to fully reopen the country and reopening the country with a lot of people unvaccinated obviously will make us very vulnverable to a third wave and potentially high levels of infection. It would also undermine out economy\u201d, Browne explained.<\/p>

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The Prime Minister insisted that vaccination was the only way out of the pandemic and encouraged everyone to \u201cget vaccinated, recognizing that each vaccinated, all protected.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Thirty three thousand two hundred and fourteen (33,214) first doses of the Covid-19 vaccines have been administered .<\/p>\n

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Fifteen thousand one hundred and thirty-three (15,133) second doses were administered.<\/p>\n

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Browne says based on the uptake in vaccinations 40 thousand doses can be administered by the end of June.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n