With the start of the new school year just around the corner, it would appear that Prime Minister Andrew Holness intends to pull out all the stops to ensure a resumption of face-to-face learning come September.

Moving swiftly to control the warning signs of the onset of a third COVID-19 wave, Holness during an Office of the Prime Minister press briefing on Monday (July 26), re-introduced a number of COVID-19 containment measures, before the originally slated expiration of the previous measures on August 10.

Speaking to his decision, he noted, “Over the course of the next two weeks we will continue to monitor the situation and determine the measures that will apply effective August 11.”

He added: “Our focus in crafting those measures will be on trying to control spread sufficiently to allow us to reopen schools to facilitate structured face-to-face learning in September.”

“That is an imperative for the government and indeed for all the persons and children who have had a really difficult time during this pandemic.”

Refusing to make any admission of error on the part of the government for introducing more relaxed measures at the start of the month, Holness expressed his awareness of the possibility of a third wave at the introduction of the measures but gambled that the country would be better off if the third wave was felt earlier and the government given sufficient time to reduce numbers before the expected reopening of schools in September.

He stated: “When we announced the new arrangements in July, we always expected, in fact, we were projecting that we would have a spike. The question would be when do you want the spike? Would you want the spike closer to September? Or more into August where you could have a chance to recover for September?”.

With the introduction of stricter COVID-19 containment measures effective today (July 27), Holness warned that the new measures were just a foreshadowing of the tighter restrictions that will be implemented come August 11, to contain the possibility of a spike in cases and ensure that schools can reopen in September.