No, PM, it’s not under control

Prime Minister Robert Abela has gone on record saying that the situation with regard to the spread of Coronavirus is under control.

We beg to differ.

Malta had been close to zero active cases in the middle of July. We had gone as low as three patients carrying the virus, and we all hoped that an announcement would have been made that the country was COVID-free. But, deep down, we all also knew that with the re-opening of the airport came risks that the number of virus cases would go up again. Add this to the irresponsible holding of mass activities, be they parties or band marches, and the rekindling of the virus became inevitable.

And so now we are back to square one, with the number of active cases shooting up to more than 300 in just three weeks. We have also surpassed 1,000 total cases since the first was registered on 7 March. We could possibly be in a worse situation in a few days’ time.

Over the past three weeks, the numbers have exploded again. That some of the new cases are of migrants who were rescued by the Armed Forces of Malta and brought to shore cannot be ignored, but to blame the increase solely on this is not correct. The numbers have gone up sharply mostly because of mass activities – we know of at least three clusters: the hotel party, the Santa Venera feast and the Paceville establishment.

We must put things into perspective. The arrival of migrants with COVID-19, although serious, is not as potentially devastating as the rest of the new cases. The migrants were immediately placed in quarantine, with no contact with the outside world. The chances of them transmitting the virus to others outside the confinement of their quarantine are next to zero.

But people who had the virus and attended parties, band marches, or mingled with others in Paceville are more likely to have transmitted the disease to others. The same goes to the two other clusters mentioned by health superintendent Charmaine Gauci last Friday – the summer school and English language school clusters are set to grow.

We were among the first to praise the government for the way it handled the situation in the first weeks and months of its presence on the islands. But now matters are different. And Abela cannot justify his “under control” statement by saying that the health sector is not stretched because very few people are ending up in hospital. Although the latest information shows that the majority of the fresher cases are of young people, who are less prone to health complications and therefore less likely to end up in hospital, sooner or later more vulnerable members of our society could be affected too, with potentially fatal results.

The health sector may not be under pressure at the moment, but with the cooler months approaching and with them the influenza season the situation could take a turn for the worse.

We understand that the COVID-19 effects on the economy with the restrictions that were imposed in March and April were shattering. And we know that the closure of the airport, restaurants and so on was a measure that could not be sustained for a long time. But the message that was sent out by the government – too quickly, as admitted by MHRA president Tony Zahra himself – was that we could return to a normal lifestyle, and this pushed people to be less careful and forget about social distancing, with the result that we have rapidly been inundated with cases again.

We are not advocating a return to the list of restrictions that we had in force until the end of June. But the new measures that have been introduced, limiting mass events to a restricted number of people, are not as easily enforced as we were given to believe. Neither is it easy to impose a fine of €50 for not wearing masks in places such as retail outlets, buses and the Gozo ferry. What we sincerely hope is that, if the police and other authorities do their job, nobody then comes up with the idea of giving an amnesty to offenders.

When, some time ago, Prime Minister Abela was asked about the risk of a second wave of the virus hitting Malta, he famously replied that waves are only in the sea.

Asked last Friday whether this could have meant that he was belittling the problem and sending the wrong message, Abela did not give a straight answer.

We hope this means he has learnt from his mistake.

Because the second wave has hit.