EDITORIAL
Some Christ Church and St. Michael residents and workers have not enjoyed the best environmental conditions of late. Smouldering waste at the dump in Lower Estate have left many unable to breathe properly and overflowing sewage from manholes along parts of the South Coast have caused untenable conditions.
Understandably, many are frustrated, including Barbados Water Authority (BWA) officials are working feverishly to implement both short and long-term solutions to correct hazards such as those in Worthing. The BWA has extended its apologies to affected persons, while performing daily disinfections of the impacted areas. As admitted by General Manager Keithroy Halliday, “We are sorry to the national community that we were not able to respond in a better timeframe given the realities of what we have been facing, whether justified or not.”
The Ministry of Health has also moved to allay public fears of the dangers of exposure to sewage by testing the potable water supply to confirm its continued safety, noting that the chlorine levels in the distilled pipes tested were at “acceptable” levels. In addition, public health inspectors have been deployed around the environs to boost education of residents on optimal hygienic practices.
It is hoped that these problems are rectified sooner rather than later. The fact that one business was forced to close its doors is very unfortunate, especially at this most critical juncture of the tourist season. In this Information Age, social media can air a problem quite faster than wished for and spread unwanted negative news, even at times distorting it from the truth. After Barbuda was destroyed by the catastrophic Hurricane Irma in September, for example, local travel officials were forced to allay fears after persons started to cancel trips to Barbados because they had mistaken the two countries.
Unfortunately, these environmental incidents are not the first of their kind. Barbadians constantly cry out about indiscriminate burning and seek the passage of legislation to criminalise the practice, yet many seem not to get the point. Late last month, the Queen Elizabeth Hospital’s mass casualty response was pressed into action after the stench from pungent smoke caused students and teachers at a primary school to become violently ill.
A small island economy such as ours will have various trials, but now is an optimal time to fine-tune the way in which we respond to the smaller challenges before they snowball into larger issues. How we handle environmental issues overall will therefore be crucial. As can be seen in these very public long-standing cases, the impact, aftermath and further treatment can be a tedious, exhausting and costly process. While these problems currently remain unsolved, it is clear that sometimes in Barbados issues of an environmental nature have to be fully seen, smelt and experienced to be dealt with in any haste. And that is unfortunate.
We must improve our responses to these matters for the betterment of ourselves and our island. Environmental concerns have to be taken far more seriously at the onset before they get out of control and affect too many citizens.