Jean Michel Lee Shim, the founder of Solidarite Marye Pike was among the few who had foreseen the sanitary crisis that Mauritius would face the moment the corona virus pandemic would grip the country. He gave his team the green light to devise a Covid-19 taskforce with calculated measures to be implemented in case of a crisis. Amidst the heaping number of critics against the measures imposed by the government in order to contain the outbreak, Jean Michel Lee Shim shares his insight on the situation. Read on.
As the founder of Solidarite Marye Pike, you came up with a Covid-19 taskforce weeks before the outbreak of Coronavirus in Mauritius. You have managed to create an awareness campaign in many needy areas. To what extent do you think it could have been beneficial to the country if other institutions did the same?
When I read about the situation in Wuhan and talked to one of our SMP doctors currently studying there, it was clear that the whole world was going on its knees given the rapidity it contaminated people and choked the lungs. A British study revealed that 1 infected person will pass on the virus to 400 in thirty days only. With proper confinement that same infected person will infect only 4. This explains why it took 67 days to contaminate the first 100,000 and only 4 days for the next 100,000 and 2 days for the third 100,000 cases.
Coming back to your question, I did not have those figures then but the way it was related to me I was very afraid for our paradise island. As you rightly pointed out I set up the Corona-task force and created awareness in our own people internally. The first thing I did without thinking about the consquences was prohibiting shaking of hands and greeting hugs and kisses and explained on our whatsapp loop the reasons for social distancing. As you said that was weeks before we got the first case. May the soul of Mr. Appa rests in peace but was he the first one or the only one who brought Corona virus on this island.?. If you believe that you would believe anything. We forgive and now we must face the music.
We bought a stock of gears including masks, safety googles, infrared thermometers, sanitizers, hand liquid soap, protective suits, medicines and we set up a small plant using 99% ethanol making our own sanitizers and disinfectants as we did not want to siphon the stock on the market leaving nothing for other people. My main concern was my people I look after living the poorest regions of the country. They live in precarious conditions, very compact and I was praying that the virus delays in reaching our shores as the compatriots living in those regions would fall like flies if ever the virus makes a break through there. Our doctors gave basic training to over 500 volunteers living around our 52 centres to come to help if needed. We bought protective gowns as well for them. Your question as to what would be the benefits today if other organisations had taken the same approach. I do not have a specific answer but certainly in terms of benefits and as the saying goes ‘forewarned is forearmed’. After all, Singapore coped so well because precisely the Government and the people fought the SARS years back.
Now that the virus is with us, it is just a question of time that it will spread all over the island. No one is protected; not even His Royal Highness, Prince Charles. We are all under the threat of contracting the virus. I urge our compatriots from Rodrigues to send any person disembarking there to quarantine and test each of them negative before they are allowed to go free and mix with your people.
How can Mauritius tackle the current sanitary crisis?
I think the most important thing to do is wash your hands properly with soap, foam it well so that any virus will detach your skin, floats into the foam and ‘swim’ away down the drains when you wash your hands under water leaving your hands virus free. How nice that sounds?. Will you now take the risk inviting your next door neighbor home? Of course not and even sweetie pie will have to come after the crisis. This is called: Love Locked down !!. Many partners living separate in Europe are being urged to lock down love and live together in confinement. Yes it is nice and you can enjoy Virus free hands; it’s all up to you and all you do is to follow to the letter the confinement instructions. So, strictly do not receive people who do not live in your house avoiding mutual contamination. In the same way, do not visit your friends and closed ones. Keep one metre away from people who do not live in your house when you walk on the streets. Walk alone and not in groups unless you all live the same house. I notice our police officers are not in protective suits and they are taking high risks of getting contaminated and in case they are infected they will be vectors of the virus and contaminate others. Certain videos show they penetrate inside houses which is not recommended for their own health and for the occupiers of the house as well. I hope our police officers had received training before they ventured out. At any rate, our police force is being stretched to the limit. They are over worked and with that level of stress we can imagine the situation on the grounds could deteriorate and provoke a negative reaction with burning, looting and rioting. We would then have lost the war against the corona virus as we have lost focus and got confused about the identity of our real enemy, corona virus. Instead of the police, we must involve our NGOs and other forces vives and this is the only way forward.
In the second phase of the SMP Covid-19 taskforce, that is in case of a crisis, your medical team will be involved in providing medical assistance. Are they already working hand in hand with the ministry of health? After the confinement, how will SMP implement the measures of its taskforce?
I have asked my team of doctors to remain safe indoors and follow confinement as Mr. Everybody. Only fools rush in. They give medical advice over the phone. We cannot risk losing our doctors. The battle is going to be very long. It takes ten years to produce a doctor and certainly we are not going to lose one in one minute. We shall only intervene when the Government shall allow us to do so. Now this is not the case. We have applied for permits on behalf of SMP staffs because many of our vulnerable people all over the island depend on us for food and medical supplies. We have our people trained and we trained over 500 compatriots living around our centres who volunteered to be trained just in case they are needed. I believe that the days when we decide what we do FOR the people are dead and gone like our DODO. Now we must engage and involve the people and see what we can do WITH the people and together we come out stronger than ever before. Action provokes Reaction and so whatever we do we must not forget that simple law of nature. We are already witnessing the poor level of compliance to our curfew directives. We pray that we do not lose more lives in riots than by contracting the virus. As I said the country has entered a war and we do not know how ferocious it will be and how long it will last. In the first place our enemies are invisible and deadly. So, we go one step at a time and take it day by day for the moment as the situation now changes on the hour. In any case there is not much that we can do when certain patients go into the critical phase when the lungs had collapsed and water accumulating inside calling for use of ventilators, drainage and other invasive medical procedures. In Mauritius we have around 100 units with ventilators, public and private and they are all fully used on non corona related patients. So the capacity is already over loaded; what on earth can we do to save those new acute corona patients? You imagine how you overload the health system and kill other patients by not following confinement and contracting / spreading the corona virus ?. Do you think those hundreds of deaths every day in Italy and Spain would not have been saved if they had more such units? Also, it is not so much a question of importing ventilators but you need trained medics as well. You do not form ICU team in one day. SMP doctors can do very little, only at the early stage to try and prevent the patients going into the critical phase necessitating ICU beds. For this reason we cannot stress more on ‘stay at home’ and confine yourself. Failure to do this simple thing, we put unnecessary breaking stress on our hospitals and our police force.
From the 18th to 24th march, 36 cases were confirmed. Dr Vasantrao Gujadur (Directeur des services santé) in a conference has predicted more than 1100 (1131) cases by next week, if rules are not abided by. Do you think the figures could even go beyond what has been predicted if the situation persists or the curve could even drop?
This is a situation brought about when people travelled abroad and brought the virus into the country. People who can afford to travel abroad are certainly not from those SMP poor regions and they are the people who live such a standard that they can afford and understand proper confinement, medicines, care in general and get the latest information about the virus. Yet we have seen the collateral damages on other innocent victims in their surroundings. We have registered a very high contamination rate in that middle class of our society. Now just imagine a situation where the above scenario started in the poor regions where our SMP people operate. !!!!!! What kind of figures you would have reached by now? Yet, it is just a question of time to spread everywhere in Mauritius. You will get more victims in the poor smp regions given their modest compact habitations and the high population density over there. I am sad for our innocent vulnerable people who rely on us for food, medicines, diapers and medical follow ups. We cannot go out and reach them under the curfew. They are so poor and certainly they have absolutely nothing to do with the negligence of those rich or middle class people who brought the virus to their doors. Statistics are not in our favour with 2 deaths out of 36 contaminations which is above 5 % and the world’s average is 1% to 3%. I wonder if we would be lucky to keep the figure of 5% and I doubt it very much. So, if you want a figure from me what will be the number of contaminations and the number of deads, I would simply tell you that your guess is as good as mine, purely guess work but certainly deaths would be in hundreds and contaminations would easily exceed ten thousands. In order to avoid those catastrophic figures, it is imperative that the population obey all the do’s and the don’ts as instructed. ONLY WAY OUT. The progression is geometric as you must surely realize.
How would you define the response of the political leadership of the country to the pandemic? Were they well prepared? Are they handling the outbreak properly with the imposed confinement and the measures in the health services?
Our Prime Minister is doing what should be done. Who would have his courage to send an Italian plane back with all the passengers? Do you realize the diplomatic, political and economic consequences of such a decision? The Prime Minister had the courage to do the right thing taking full responsibility of his action. That was bold and just think of the consequences had he failed to do so? He was equally bold to shut down our borders completely? And now he moved on to confinement and curfew. What else you may reproach him for what he had failed to do?. On top he is getting the medicines needed in our hospitals let alone the economic rescue package. We are the first nation to have started Chloroquine treatment on corona virus patients followed by France and the united States of America. According to our prime Minister we are getting good results. It is worth mentioning that he is sending a special Air Mauritius plane over the weekend to China to bring equipments and medicines. Hats off to you, Honourable Prime Minister. On the economic front, I reckon that there is a category of workers, the self-employed working on a daily basis who should be registered like fishermen and same as the latter who receive a bad weather allocation ( sea is good though ) , the self-employed too must receive a ‘corona allocation’ during the curfew. They have a family to look after. It is so easy to criticize but you tell me what else in the place of the Prime Minister you could have done to make it better?. Look at the indiscipline voiced out by the Prime Minister from people using their financial muscles to build up huge stocks of food and with this bad attitude we are living under the constant threat of food shortages and riots fired by fake news on social media. This is not helping the country at all. The focus is on food rather than on fighting that dreadful invisible corona virus. The situation could degenerate beyond repairs and we could mourn more deaths in riots than by the corona virus. I would close facebook during the curfew albeit being labeled a dictator. I would not put lives of our compatriots in danger. That would be another bold measure much appreciated by a huge majority of our citizens. This is not the time to do politics on facebook, over dead bodies.
Do you think the overflow of critics toward the government demonstrates a lack of trust among the citizens of Mauritius? How can we possibly sensitize/ encourage Mauritians to follow the rules?
It is human nature to apportion blame and lay it on some one’s else shoulders in times of difficulties and hardships. The Government is the first punching bag as always, specially its Prime Minister. Let it be so and rightly so as had it not been so, people would have blamed their neighbours or other communities. At the very beginning of the crisis people of Asian origins were badly treated in the world. In tubes or buses, stay away from a Chinese/Asian and if he coughs just run away the fastest you can and disappear. Therefore let us criticize the Government if that avoids conflicts among our peers, families and different communities. If Government means the Honourable Pravind Kumar, so be it as I am sure he would understand and forgive his compatriots (laughs). We all know that he is doing his utmost best and what is right for the country. The Government and the population together must stand behind our medical professionals. They are the front liners and many of them had already been infected while saving our brothers and sisters. They are risking their lives for us and in return we are being imprudent and could get contaminated and make their lives even more difficult. We all agree they are doing a fantastic job but ask them whether they would appreciate we are exposing ourselves to get contaminated and create more troubles for them. I think that the concept of Civil Police must be introduced immediately like we have in the UK. They would be your next door neighbors or your mates in the Community Centres or volunteers for years at your church or mosque or temple down the lane. Households would more likely listen to them and abide by their instructions rather than the big ‘mama words and the allez cabris in english’ that our regular police forces throw at them. At the same time we do not have to risk the lives of our Police Officers by them getting infected or if they are already infected then the risk that they pass it on to the poor civilians. Getting corona virus from an officer after receiving the big ‘mama words and the allez cabris in English’ would simply adding insult to injury (not so nice to be insulted by someone and get corona virus as a bonus from him ). The police officers can help the medical professionals disinfecting our hospitals, public places and deliver food to the needy in those areas where old and sick people are stranded. They would be welcome like Lords in the same regions where now they are not appreciated for the job they are doing. (The police is coming to help and everybody is happy. How is that for a change?). We are all walking inside a long dark tunnel and the journey is strenuous and tough . We need all our strengths and together as a nation we shall see light at the end of the tunnel. Ensam tout posib . Very important to bear in mind that we do not have the information which the head of state has. We can argue that the measures are too draconian but no prime minister would be happy to take such unpopular decision, politically suicidal. The recent draconian measures are proofs that the Prime Minister is not doing politics but is doing what is best for the Mauritians.
Do you think Mauritius could possibly manage the pandemic the way Singapore did?
Singapore is by far the best country in the world managing the sanitary crisis with only 2 deaths and 558 contaminated cases so far (0.35% compared to us over 5%). The people internalized with the protocols laid down by the Government because the latter engaged and involved the people. The Government realized rightly that the only force that works in those difficult moments is persuasion through education and transparency. Singapore is not even half the size of Mauritius with some 6 million residents living one on top of each other, very densely populated in a multicultural society is the benchmark for the world how to contain the virus. Singapore is not locked down and people attend to their daily routines including masses in churches. Social and business lives are still going strong as if business as usual ( perhaps we should invest in Singapore markets in Singapore dollars reaping both dividends and appreciation of Sing$; a refuge to your life time savings ). This is the result when you engage and involve people. A person quarantined at home would be sent a link in an sms and the system will detect if that person is really at home. If he leaves his phone at home and goes out the punishment is severe and he will be named and shamed. At SMP, we trained volunteers to go out in protective suits and take temperatures using infrared thermometers and to advise those people to self-isolate if they do 37.8 degrees centigrade or more. We developed that sms technique and google location at Sms Pariaz research team just in case the Government would call on NGOs to help. Only through making laws and enforcing same by police charging with sticks are not going to work. Confinement is stressing and psychologically drain people to the verge of depression and yet this is the only way out. So, it is important to get the people on board. Churches were closed last Sunday and as a devout catholic I thought I would attend a remote mass on my TV last Sunday listening to His Eminence Cardinal Piat in his homily exhorting our people to seize this opportunity during the period of lent to offer the best sacrifice of ‘confinement’ to Jesus Christ, Our Lord who reigns and live with God our Father for ever and ever. Not too late to receive the helping hand of the Diocese of Port Louis and the Heads of all religions of this country like in Singapore. Let us go in it together. Where are our ‘forces vives’ in this difficult time? Wake up guys. The country needs you. Imagine or let us dream ( we need a licence to dream? ) an Air Mauritius flight lands at SSR Airport with 200 Chinese experts with on board logistics including equipments, consumables and 20 Singaporean experts in the field. It simply would be Moses freeing his people from sufferings. Is it not what we should be doing? They are just a phone call away!!!!! ( Professor Xu Hui TONGJII MEDICAL COLLEGE ; WUHAN; PHONE 18607160263 ; they are waiting for our phone call to help us with Men Machines Medicines). South Korea is another good example to follow. They are doing extremelly well.