Dear Editor,

Prime Minister, it’s about time your Administration urgently establishes a security task force to specifically deal with those that are flouting the Disaster Risk Management Act (DRMA) and, by extension, refusing to wear masks and obey social distancing guidelines in public.

Such task force should include the police/military, the municipal police, the Public Health Department inspectors, National Solid Waste Management Authority, and the Jamaica Fire Brigade.

These entities should be given full autonomy to carry out spot checks, random road stops, and street patrols in order to curtail those in the public space, such as operators and users of public transportation who are in contravention of the DRMA .

Drivers and passengers who are caught without face masks should be ticketed. Also, drivers should face additional charges for aiding and abetting passengers who commit infractions while travelling in their motor vehicles.

The same type of checks ought to be carried out by the public health inspectors who should target restaurants and bars, supermarkets, and all other business establishments dealing with the public.

The municipal police should also be mandated to carry out sporadic checks on vendors who are not wearing masks while serving the general public.

The National Solid Waste Management Authority and the Jamaica Fire Brigade should also be empowered to participate in these operations so as to increase the manpower on the ground, thereby strengthening enforcement.

Those businesses found in breach of the DRMA should be charged, and where necessary ordered closed.

I’m quite sure that once these measures are put in place we will see a massive reduction in the galloping novel coronavirus cases and the loss of lives.

If the relevant authorities are serious about curtailing the spread of this vicious coronavirus, they must quickly implement tough measures that can help to put the brakes on the many unruly, stubborn, and ignorant fools we have living among us.

Prime Minister Holness, it’s about time we close the gate on those unruly Jamaicans who are hell-bent on destroying the good image of this our beloved country, Jamaica.

Luther A Irving

Youth & Community Advocate

amjampromo1@yahoo.com