ARE ILLEGAL VENEZUELANS BRINGING THE VIRUS TO T&T?

The Trinidad Guardian has taken up the story about the possibility of the COVID-19 virus being spread by one or more illegal Venezuelan immigrants. The problem with this story is that while it is (of course) very possible that illegal Venezuelans are bringing the virus to our shores, there is no report of any type of tracing being done by either the relevant authorities or even by the erstwhile newspaper, who seems very happy to report this speculation as if it were fact.  When you add to that the unsubstantiated rumour that is going around that Dr. Rowley, fearing that he will lose the impending election, is looking to use the COVID-19 pandemic as an excuse to delay the election  ... on the ground of 'national emergency' ... you have a mix that is potentially explosive and one capable of causing tremendous damage to the mental health of the country.

Speaking only for myself, I can't believe that there is any truth in that rumour about delaying the election. It would take a huge degree of cynicism and dishonesty that frankly, I don't believe that Messrs. Rowley & Co. are capable of. Don't get me wrong: I am not saying that I do not believe that they are capable of being dishonest, I just don't believe that they would go down what can euphemistically be called 'the Guyanese path'.

So we are back once more to this story about illegal Venezuelans possibly bringing the deadly virus to our shores. Well, if there is any (and I mean 'any') truth to this, it ought to be able to be cleared up fairly quickly by competent and professional tracing. This means (of course) tracing everybody that the known victims have been in contact with over the two weeks prior to them contracting the virus.
This would also have the added benefit of identifying and finding the illegals in our country ... if they are indeed the source of the infection.

But we ought to be very careful about going down the 'rabbit holes' of unsubstantiated rumours and allegations that distract from the real issues that confront us. And this does not mean that we shouldn't be fixing our porous borders. We should! And  pronto (if you will forgive the irony of using Spanish to end this post)!