Tufton’s comments divisive, says Jamaican advocacy group

In response to this statement, the Jamaica Coalition for a Healthy Society (JCHS) would like to inform the public that the minister’s position has nothing to do with public health, as particularly since the advent of the Omicron strain, being vaccinated does not prevent anyone from being infected with or transmitting the virus.

For example, public health data out of Pennsylvania, USA, in January 2022, showed that 42% of persons who were infected with Covid-19 were fully vaccinated. In many other countries such as the UK, Norway, the Netherlands and Israel, their Covid-19 infection rates are high among the fully vaccinated.

A more logical way of creating a controlled setting would be to make the single most significant criterion for attendance to be that of a negative test for Covid-19.

The minister’s statement is to be seen as unjustifiable discrimination against the unvaccinated. In effect, his comments are divisive and are intent on punishing 80 percent of the Jamaican population.