On Tuesday (April 13, 2021) in Parliament, Prime Minister Andrew Holness announced new measures under the Disaster Risk Management. The gazetted order has been posted online on the Office of the Prime Minister’s website. It has not yet been posted on the Ministry of Justice website. I have posted a copy of the Gazette below.
At a press briefing this morning (March 2, 2021), the Ministry of Health and Wellness representatives gave more details about Jamaica’s plans for vaccinating people against Covid-19. The first batch of vaccines is slated to arrive in the country this week and vaccination is planned to begin soon thereafter.
Left to right: Permanent Secretary Dunstan Bryan, Minister of State Juliet Cuthbert-Flynn, Minister Christopher Tufton, Chief Medical Officer Dr Jacqueline Bissasor-McKenzie. Also participating Dr Melody Ennis, Director of Family Health Services (Pictured at top right Antoinette Aiken, providing sign language interpretation)
The first of the Covid-19 Disaster Risk Management Orders was broadcast in March 2020, ten months ago. I don’t know how long the government intends to continue issuing these orders. The question remains as to whether this is the way in which these measures should be issued on an ongoing basis, this long after the start of the pandemic, one of the issues being the lack of parliamentary oversight provided by this mechanism.
The gazetted order has been posted on the website of the Office of the Prime Minister, but not yet on the websites of the Ministry of Justice and the Ministry of Health and Wellness.
One of the most significant changes in this amendment (which needs to be read in conjunction with Order No. 15 itself) is the extension of many of the measures to do with entry into Jamaica to April 15, 2021.
The predominant pattern to date has been to extend measures for a matter of weeks. In this instance the measures have been extended for 5 months, though it has been done in a way that allows for adjustments to the specific requirements to be made fairly easily. It does signal, however, the thinking of the governement that some such measures will be needed through at least the first quarter of next year.
The gazetted order has been posted on the Ministry of Justice website, but hasn’t yet been posted on the Office of the Prime Minister or Ministry of Health and Wellness websites at the time of publishing this blog post.
For convenience, I have re-posted Order No. 15 here.
On October 28, 2020, Prime Minister Andrew Holness announced some changes to the Disaster Risk Management measures. The measures are detailed in the Gazette of Disaster Risk Management (Enforcement Measures) (No. 15) Order, 2020, a copy of which is posted below.
The gazetted Order has been posted on the Ministry of Health & Wellness website (scroll to the bottom of their page), but at the time of publishing this blog, it is not yet on the websites of the Ministry of Justice or the Office of the Prime Minister.