Bars, clubs to close by midnight in face of Omicron
(CNS): The government will be rolling out new regulations forcing bar, club and restaurant owners to close by midnight every evening until New Year’s Eve as a way of preventing a potential new and explosive wave of COVID-19 infections related to the Omicron variant.
During Thursday’s press briefing, Medical Officer of Health Dr Samuel Williams-Rodriguez confirmed that the first case of Omicron, which was identified in a traveller yesterday, had come from the United States and was picked up after a positive lateral flow test on day two after the individual’s arrival.
This means the person and their family were out and about in the community for two days before isolating. There are also now another ten suspected cases in travellers, which raises concerns of a dangerous holiday spike in the virus.
Premier Wayne Panton suggested that, if possible, people should should stay home from work over the coming days, as he announced a number of new regulations that are expected to be rolled out after a Cabinet meeting tomorrow, including the early closing for bars and a reduction on social gathering numbers to cut super-spreader events.
He said mandatory testing would be required for all front line workers and there would also be a requirement that anyone visiting the prison or a care home or other institution must produce a certified negative test that is less than 24 hours old or be tested at the location before entry.
“Unfortunately COVID continues to be a cause for concern for us and vigilance is required with the omicron variant currently raising the alarm across the globe,” Panton said, as he urged people to re-think their socializing plans for Christmas. “There is no definitive playbook for COVID-19… This challenge will be with us for some time to come.”
He said scientists were learning more about Omicron every day but it is expected to outpace Delta shortly and we cannot be complacent. Even if the virus is less severe, it spreads more easily and appears to evade protection from vaccines and previous infection, so there will be more hospitalizations and deaths.
“As a country we must and will continue to take the measures necessary in response to all variants, including Omicron, to protect our health system,” the premier added, before he announcing the new measures that were coming.
Despite the heightened concern, government is not introducing any new mandatory quarantine requirements for travellers from countries such as the UK, where the Omicron variant is fuelling further record-breaking infections, as “that would kill tourism”.
There are also plans to remove the southern African countries placed on a red list earlier this month, given that this strain of COVID-19 is now in at least 77 countries around the world and it makes no sense to single them out.
While government officials appear very concerned about the virus, with both the premier and Health Minister Sabrina Turner urging people to stay home and scale back the partying and socializing over Christmas to small close family gatherings, Tourism Minister Kenneth Bryan confirmed that government still plans to allow a cruise ship to dock in Cayman on 28 December.
The testing regimes are being tightened and anyone found to have Omicron, regardless of their vaccination status, are now required to isolate for 14 days. The health minister also urged people to report positive lateral flow tests, even if they have no symptoms. She said people must seek a PCR test if a home kit shows they are positive for COVID in order to find out whether or not they have the Omicron variant.
Officials pressed home the vaccination message, urging everyone to get their shots and for those who have already had two shots, to get a booster dose. Dr Williams-Rodriguez confirmed that “fully vaccinated” for travellers means two doses, but a booster shot is still needed to protect people from this new variant.
Panton also confirmed that since 8 September, 105 people have been treated in hospital for COVID-19 in Cayman. Most of them had other health problems and 80% were not full vaccinated.
Urging people to get their shots, he said that healthcare providers here were beginning to burn out and the country needed to keep infections down to prevent stress on the system.
See the press briefing on CIGTV below:
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Category: Business, Health, Medical Health, Politics, Tourism
welcome to wonderland where nothing makes sense.
thank you pact.
ok…as a triple vaxxer i will now avoid all testing…..
we played by your rules but now you are punishing us the same as the people who did not play…
omicron = a cold.
Lots of people work jobs where they can’t stay home under any circumstances and if they have ti stay home airplanes won’t be able to leave nor arrive. I’m just saying so stop passing the nonsense comments. Too much exaggerating fear and scare being passed into the public. Get on with the business of opening the island January 27, 2022.
Quote: The government will be rolling out new regulations forcing bar, club and restaurant owners to close by midnight every evening until New Year’s Eve as a way of preventing a potential new and explosive wave of COVID-19 infections related to the Omicron variant.
Huh? Does Covid come out after midnight? Hundreds of people could get infected during evening dinner or clubbing from 9 – 12. Lol can’t make this stuff up. Stop making up stupid rules please. Enough!
Quote: Despite the heightened concern, government is not introducing any new mandatory quarantine requirements for travellers from countries such as the UK, where the Omicron variant is fuelling further record-breaking infections, as “that would kill tourism”.
Kill Tourism? Tourism is already dead in case you haven’t noticed. PACT made sure of that in Sept by cancelling the re-opening and causing the major airlines to pull out until Feb next year!
And further killing it by adding LFT tests last minute, medical insurance last minute and then really last minute and basically impossible shortening the testing time to 24 hours during Christmas week when people have had rapid test appointments booked/ PCR appointments booked for months. If we do decide to keep this vacation planned for next week which has caused so much needless stress to plan do to changing policies, it will be our last to Cayman.
And if you pick up the bug here, you and all your party will be placed in quarantine.
Shouldn’t you be closing the supermarkets before the bars, restaurants and nightclubs. Supermarkets are open for 16 hours a day and many of the staff don’t know or refuse to wear a face mask properly. The hot food sections in Losters are a magnet for infection with self serve utensils sometimes lying in the pans on top of the food. Most importantly thousands of people pass through our supermarkets each day. Don’t bother mentioning the safe distancing in supermarkets……it doesn’t exist.
Covid doesn’t spread on surfaces – it spreads through the air, so your point about the hot food trough is irrelevant.
Solutions just for you: hire a personal, no-contact, shopper=>cook at home. Problem solved. You can then decide if you want to spray your carrots with lysol.
Cayman had the best reopening plan in the world.
I have been critical of the Government in the past but the facts speak for themselves.
25 days of open borders and cases are decreasing.
@Jim
Don’t forget to mention restrictions are increasing as well.
@9:30 decreasing because no one is coming. It was a fake opening pandering to voters.
So the virus can be transmitted after midnight but not before?
Truly we have a government of morons.
I am so over covid. Everyone who wants to be vaxxed is. Omicron is more contagious but less serious, as is to be expected from the natural evolution of any virus. These new rules will achieve nothing but more harm to the community and the economy.
We have a disease which is rampant in the community but we are still pursuing policies designed to keep it outside our borders. It’s here. We have to live with it. This kind of bullshit from government is counterproductive, pointless and asinine.
I welcomed Wayne’s appointment, but what a disappointment he has turned out to be.
Just trust the science everyone. Just one more booster, one more jab, one more lockdown.
We trusted the science first, just a lockdown to keep us all safe. Then it was trust the vaccine, and we all did it. Then it was we will all need a booster, and we all rush to that.
When will it end? trust the scientists? we did, and the goal posts have been moving ever since. Get it wrong once? that’s ok. A second time? it happens. A third time?
At what point do we stop being taken for a ride?
It won’t. Coronavirus is here now just like any other virus that’s been popping up over the last few decades due to severe overpopulation, climate change and lack of sanitation.
People like you, waiting for a “cure all” or for it to “end” are a part of the problem. Learn to live with it. Ie: sanitation, social distancing, mask wearing, vaccines, boosters, etc. so we’re at least not bombarded.
Stupid is as our government does. Shocking incompetence. What is next? Thumb screws for witches?
Glad we now realize Omicron is Gizmo’s evil spawn, Spike; and is only dangerous after midnight.
9:05 You beat me to the Gremlin reference! To all the ladies out there don’t lose your glass slipper when you get kicked out of bars/clubs at midnight.. god we are living in a fantasy world. And not in a good way…
Guess omicron wakes up at midnight.
Stupid stupid stupid to allow Passanger ship to come Cayman now, but common sense are not common any more, rght Kenneth?
These yahooos..
One death world wide from Omicron.
Hey! I know! Let’s destroy our economy! I have a plan…let’s act Irrationally, screw all businesses, ruin our relationship with tourism partners, shut down businesses, Fuc$ everyone, and deprive our population of all civil rights. Amazing idea! Two enthusiastic thumbs up!
It was totally understandable to lock Cayman down and have strict rules on movement early one when the medical profession didn’t know what COVID was. We are now approaching the two year anniversary, I got three vaccination shots and we know the risks. I would like government to stop with the wave of regulations restricting my movements and ability to earn a living. We did the best we all could to delay the impact of these COVID strains. It’s now time for each person to make their own choices, stay home, go out, whatever.
THANK YOU @8:41pm
Pants on fire idiotic reaction to what is likely a mild version of the flu. Great job Wayne, if you want to ruin a country. What there is 1 death world wide? So let’s totally overreact and destroy businesses. Sounds responsible to me. Not to mention letting a flipping cruise ship disembark. You couldn’t even make this $hit up if you were a novelist. The level of incompetence is shocking.
So closing restaurants and bars @ 12 will keep Omicron from spreading? This doesn’t make any sense. People will just go out earlier and congregate more in one place which increases the risks of spreading this virus. 10 people has since passed due to Covid and my question is why? Did they really had to die? Last year people and the old government made sacrifices to save lives. People lost their employments, lost their homes and lost their businesses. For what? So the government could open the flood gates, spread the virus at national levels, making our children sick, our elderly and vulnerable at risk of dying, and for what reason.
So to go back to an earlier post by our government “Covid is here to stay and we must get vaccinated and learn to live with it” so why are these new regulations being implemented which in my personal opinion makes no sense.
GREAT NEWS
Pacthetic
So despite coming through one of the highest community transmission rates for delta in the world which proved no threat to our health system….we are now going backwards with nonsensical measures to tackle a mild form of the winter flu?
Welcome to wonderland.
Idiots…and not one mention of Vax passport system. Why are the treble vaxxed being punished to protect the risk of the unvaxxed overwhelming our health system?
There’s no reason for a vaccination passport – you still transmit Delta and Omicron even if you’re vaccinated. There is no justification for denying unvaccinated people access to anything.
That said, people who don’t bother with vaccination are increasing their own risk of serious illness and death. I would say that if the hospital reaches capacity they should give priority to vaccinated patients. The unvaccinated want to take their chances that’s their choice, but that should be a consequence.
Why would vaccinated patients need priority? I thought the vaccine stop serious illness & death? If the vaccines work then you shouldn’t worry about any beds period!
It substantially increases your chances of avoiding serious illness and death. A few people will still get seriously ill but at at least they did what they could as opposed to the unvaccinated who gave zero Fs.
Where is the LOL button?
Every 4 years with a big X
Cruise in covid.
What is going to kill tourism is this 24 hr. Before departure testing. We can not locate a testing site within 2 hours drive that will test us and have results back with in 24 hours. The best they can do currently is 2-3 days. This is for the rapid antigen test. People are testing for covid, testing for travel, testing for close contact, testing to go back to work, testing to visit relatives on the holiday. Think our trip will need to be cancelled.
With walls of LFTs at every pharmacy in North America, it’s quite possible you’re not equipped to problem solve for travel during this time…and that might be for the best.
What about the churches? Assume they are to be closed by midnight as well?
After midnight mass
No midnight mass for thou
Personally I would prefer that the cruise ship stayed in its home port or at sea to protect our environment. However if it docks and no one is allowed off I am OK with that too.
Sadly I suspect that Premier Bryan has his own agenda in which public health is not the principal consideration and Cabinet is too fragmented to do anything sensible in relation to his fiefdom.
“My people” Bryan must be under relentless pressure from Kel Thompson, Kirkconnell Family, Dart, all the other ReOpen Cayman characters, Briggs-Bodden tender business, foreign-owned duty free merchants, the opaque CI Port Authority, the pawn shops, a handful of Stingray Captains, and the tacky tchotchke merchant landlords of his home district – in addition to the barking FCCA, and liner executives. Those are the background power-brokers fueling the sell-out. We should redirect the blame to where it predictably belongs and expose their historic power to corrupt.
Its not going to be enough sorry. January will be a full lockdown month you wait and see if im not right
The Premier is doing his best but simply does not get it. If the Premier believes that companies in the Cayman Islands will do what is best from a public health perspective with being required to do so by law he is more naive than I thought.
The fact that they are unwilling cancel the 28 December cruise arrival or even test arriving cruise for Omicron says it all. They are not taking this as seriously as they should. Someone owes somebody something for election support quite possibly and that is more important than the safety of our people.
By comparison in relation to protecting our population from Omicron, closing bars at midnight is nothing compared to dumping thousands of potentially infected cruise passengers into our capital in day time.
Here is everything you need to know about the ‘rona – from the Pactlopedia.
1.Don’t put it near light, especially sunlight, it can kill it.
2.Don’t let it get wet with water nor give it any water to drink nor bathe it.
3.No matter how much it cries, no matter how much it begs, NEVER feed it after midnight.
Probably taking advise from Jon Jon, do you think a full moon affects the transmission of Covid or maybe only if you’re riding a donkey?
We have some further information today on the likely cruise ship population that is due to arrive – untested – on our shores in 12 days. The probability that they will have Omicron is going up. CNN
“A wave of new Omicron cases is beginning to surge in America and could peak as early as January, the Centers for Disease Controls (CDC) has warned, as states are scrambling to prepare for overloaded hospitals. The US has passed 800,000 deaths, including 1 in 100 Americans over the age of 65.
The Omicron variant accounted for nearly 3% of Covid cases in the US as of Saturday – up from only 0.4% the week before, according to data from the CDC. The variant is expected to continue rising rapidly, based on the experiences of other countries and could be dominant within weeks.”
What a load of shit.
Clowns. All of them.
Ah yes, closing the bars and clubs early should stop it dead in its tracks. What a clever premier we have.
Seems sensible to me. The biggest spread is always when you are a few drinks down late at night in crowded bars and clubs.
Super spreader house parties will proliferate.
They think that they have no other options. This is madness.
The press briefing was a total car crash.
The premier mumbled couldn’t read his speech and had no idea of the facts. He didn’t even know the new variant cases.
He didn’t know when the new regs come into effect and restaurant’s must be in despair as to bookings for Christmas and how many people can attend, what does one facility mean.
The cruise ship should never be allowed but KB demands it or will jump ship and bring down PACT
But what was most apparent was KB making sly comments when the Premier spoke his speech at the end. Clearly he has aspirations and the knife is just waiting to stab Panton well and truly in the back.
Do you beleive KB has the mental capacity???
Well that what happens when you open the boarders?
Sorry Mr. Premier, Hon. Health Minister and revered advising doctors, I don’t get it..but maybe it’s me.
This “curfew” ends at midnight, up until Dec 31, because….
…covid and any of it’s variants are sensitive to and respect time constraints or,
…Omicron goes into “passive” mode after midnight or,
…this is the biggest load of BS I’ve heard!
Please…if Government thinks a curfew to bars and clubs will do the trick then make it a complete curfew and direct them to close – except for outdoor activity! Unlikely now but that would work better than telling the virus to go home at midnight!!
These titles are pathetic, Honourable my arse.
They are here to serve us, just do the f job
Shhhh! Logic? That is like Kryptonite to the Panton/PACT Clown Car.
16 @ 6:36 pm – as a boarder, I’m open to anything legal!! Borders!!
Snow, surf or skate?
Soooooooooooooooo stupid!
The measures announced are positive but do not go nearly far enough if the goal is to significantly slow Omicron.
You wanted facts-resistant woke idiots, you got it.
depends what you mean. could be interpreted both ways.
Get vaccinated and let’s get moving on with life. Let the unvaccinated take their chances.
Businesses should be planning for closure due to positive case absenteeism. At some point, an operational threshold will be crossed and managers can no longer have the office open or serve customers. That’s what owners should see coming. Bars and restaurants are only open until a critical mass of their servers, cooks, and waitstaff are sent home to convalesce. Government policy is still not aligned with the short term business forecast of living with Omicron’s voracious R0. Positive day 2 traveller/family case sequencing is already almost a week old.
Bars should get creative and start having parties that start at 4:00- midnight outside the venues
So, it is ok to gather in bars for hours before midnight, but after midnight the virus is going to start spreading. Then, it is going to be ok on New Year’s Eve to go out and party it up. Does any of this make sense?
Indeed – Merry Christmas from all of us here at Big Money, we hope you like Omicron.
We need to learn to live with Covid.
Get your shots and your boosters, masks required in places you need to go (banks, grocery stores), no masks required in places that are discretionary (restaurants gyms).
Scrap testing.
If you are sick stay home.
What are your thoughts on having 200 Omicron patients needing hospital care at the same time – let them die?
Yes, if that’s what it takes
Pls stay home because after midnight is when the viruses come out to play. What a joke!
It is irresponsible for us to allow tourism under these regulations.
We need to encourage visitors not to come.
Our reputation will forever be scarred as we enforce quarantine for vacationers and their families if by chance one of them happens to test positive through routine testing.
What do you mean “your reputation will be”?
I think that was done many goal posts back.
Cruise ship on 28 December, really ? Can’t make this stuff up.
It wont be coming.
I hope that you are right but it is still being advertised on the website
https://www.hollandamerica.com/en_US/find-a-cruise/C1W07I/J187.html
5.30pm Next thing is our poor stingrays will be suffering from Omicron.
Vaccinate the rays!
Just insane that people were out and about with Omicron. Avoid all restaurants, bars and stores for the next few weeks! Also insane that a cruise ship is coming as the pandemic rapidly escalates!
Why avoid every bar, restaurant etc. why not just contract trace location. I’m a tourist and the only place you would have to avoid if I tested positive would be my hotel room, my lounge chair ,my plane seat, rental car. I do carry on, wear a mask etc and I stay away from bars hopping.there may be a restaurant or two for pickup. Do contract tracking but I’m sure they weren’t everywhere!
Not to worry – they wont be in the bars at midnight (which is the really important issue) nor will they be around for a LFT test on day 2, 5 r 10 to show if they had Omnicron.
Thanks, Reopen Cayman. Thanks for the coming misery, illness and possible deaths of people who have no voice. Where are you “tourists aren’t the problem” cretins now?
Oh grow up and get some perspective. We couldn’t stay closed forever because of possible new variants. Omicron is mild in comparison to previous variants, it’s just spread more easily. Time to move on.
This was community spread by the local community. At least tourists are vaccinated. Thank those in the community for breaking quarantine for spreading it. And by the way, who have never been held accountable for it and never will.
Tell that to New Orleans and all the ‘vaccinated’ passengers & crew that tested positive before returning to port!
Omicron LAUGHS at the ‘vaccine’ just like other virus’ like seasonal flu that has so many variants that “squeeze past” that flu vaccine. I’m more wary of the ‘VACCINATED’ who now are positive, asymptomatic and superspreaders!
Please Minister of Tourism, tell the cruise ship to pass on by, we do not need this added stressor at this time.
We can’t please everyone, some things just aren’t worth the risk or headache.
No one cares anymore.
Let us be free and live our lives.
What is the point of living if you’re locked in your house all day? Or unable to see your loved ones till you’re dead?
Time for change.
Corruption is rife.
These politricks have had NOTHING to do with the virus for some time.
Isn’t this the exact opposite policy The Honorable claimed he was going to do? Didn’t he endlessly repeat they were ‘reshaping’ the tourism product towards stay-over? Thankfully they figured out the really bad variations of COVID apparently come out after midnight.
As usual money is valued more than lives
Politicians owe people or want something and we pay.
welcome to wonderland.