Basseterre, St. Kitts, December 11, 2020 (SKNIS): The COVID-19 quarantine system in St. Kitts and Nevis has been very effective in ensuring that inbound travellers are separated from the local population to protect against the spread of the novel coronavirus. This is essential since all 27 cases of the COVID-19 were imported.
At the December 09, 2020, National Emergency Operations Centre (NEOC) COVID-19 Weekly Briefing Dr. Hazel Laws, Chief Medical Officer, reiterated that all arriving passengers are placed in quarantine at a government-designated facility or a COVID-19 certified hotel. There is also an option for persons to quarantine at home.
The government-designated facilities at the OTI in St. Kitts and Pot Works in Nevis are monitored by local law enforcement. Individuals staying at certified hotels are required to wear wrist bands that indicate how long they have been in quarantine. Members of the COVID-19 Compliance Task Force and hotel security enforce the quarantine rules there. Meanwhile, persons quarantined at home pay for 24/7 private security, who ensure that there are no breaches.
“So far between October 31st and present, the system has been working and we have not had any instance whereby an individual has escaped quarantine,” Dr. Laws stated, referring to the period when the borders were reopened.
She added that the extensive measures placed to protect persons along the corridor of containment have also been very successful to date.
The corridor of containment refers to the areas or services that inbound travellers must access when they arrive on the island on the way to the quarantine site. These are the R. L. Bradshaw International Airport, certified COVID-19 taxi service, and finally the appropriate quarantine site.
Persons are not allowed to deviate from the corridor of containment or breach the conditions of quarantine. If a traveller is confirmed with COVID-19, they are immediately placed in isolation.