PM Allen Chastanet defends Quarantine Fees: “It’s not just the hotel room”

Quarantine fees are expected to be introduced in Saint Lucia from October 15. In a statement on Wednesday, Chief Medical Officer Dr. Sharon Belmar-George stressed that quarantine continues to be an important component for the containment and overall management of Saint Lucia’s COVID-19 response. To date, the country has recorded 28 COVID-19 cases with zero deaths.

“From March 2020, quarantine centres were set up in Saint Lucia using various hotels to facilitate the large numbers of returning nationals and any non-nationals that may arrive of concern. Quarantine services have been provided free of charge to the public. In an effort to sustain the availability of state based quarantine options, it has become necessary to apply a fee which has been subsidized by the government,” Dr. Belmar-George announced.

She stated that from October 15, 2020 quarantine daily fees will be applied as follows:
– For single occupancy: USD $95.00
– Double occupancy: USD $165.00
– Triple occupancy: USD $240.00

On Wednesday, Prime Minister Allen Chastanet revealed that the government had intended to begin charging persons in July, but due to demand, that decision was put on hold. “But we’ve reached the point right now where the numbers of persons coming back home have come down significantly and we have to pass on the cost of the quarantining to persons,” Chastanet said during an appearance on Timothy Poleon’s Newsspin program. “The difference is now persons only need to be quarantined for seven days. If they test negative on the 7th day, we let them out. We’re going to be putting an arm band on them, so from a contact tracing perspective it makes it easier.”

Why US $95.00 per day for single occupancy?

“That’s the cost,” the prime minister said. “I mean, it’s not just the hotel room because remember the hotel that is going to provide that service has to dedicate to that because you can’t co-mingle, meaning you can’t have other guests that are going to be at the hotel. We also have heightened security. Sadly we’ve seen persons who have come back here and family members or loved ones have attempted to go into their room…The persons that are going to be serving them have to be nurses, trained in terms of how to deal with the potential exposure”.

He added: “So, it’s not just the cost of the room, it’s the cost of the food and it’s the cost of all of the support mechanisms around it to make that work. The fact is is that the state has been bearing that cost to the tune of about US $1 million a month.”