Mem­ber of Par­lia­ment for Cu­mu­to / Man­zanil­la, Dr Rai Rag­bir MP, is urg­ing Gov­ern­ment to pre­pare for “the health and med­ical reper­cus­sions to cit­i­zens”, should vol­canic ash from the erupt­ing La Soufriere vol­cano in St Vin­cent and the Grenadines reach T&T air­space.

In a state­ment re­leased to­day, Dr Rag­bir ob­serves that the re­gion al­ready is ex­pe­ri­enc­ing high lev­els of Sa­ha­ran Dust, and the added com­pli­ca­tion of vol­canic ash in the at­mos­phere is a ma­jor con­cern. He warns that should the East­er­ly Trade winds in­ten­si­fy in ve­loc­i­ty, the re­sult could be vol­canic ash be­ing pushed in a more souther­ly di­rec­tion to­wards Trinidad and To­ba­go.

He is call­ing on gov­ern­ment to be proac­tive and have a plan of ac­tion in place should this oc­cur.

“As a med­ical Doc­tor, I am deeply con­cerned about the health of those im­pact­ed, as in­hal­ing vol­canic ash can be ex­treme­ly fa­tal to hu­man health, re­sult­ing from res­pi­ra­to­ry com­pli­ca­tions due to the harm­ful aerosols and poi­so­nous gas­es that are present in vol­canic,” Dr Rag­bir says in the re­lease.

He added: “Per­sons can al­so ex­pe­ri­ence symp­toms sim­i­lar to that of the Coro­n­avirus, such as run­ny nose, sore throat, cough­ing, wheez­ing, short­ness of breath—and in some cas­es, an at­tack of bron­chi­tis.  Those with pre-ex­ist­ing con­di­tions can al­so ex­pe­ri­ence vi­su­al chal­lenges as eyes may be­come itchy or blood­shot.  There can be corneal abra­sions or scratch­es, re­sult­ing in con­junc­tivi­tis.”

The Cu­mu­to / Man­zanil­la MP said in the midst of the vol­canic erup­tion, con­tain­ing the spread of the coro­n­avirus be­comes even more of a chal­lenge.

“In their des­per­a­tion to flee the dev­as­ta­tion, per­sons will most like­ly aban­don the health pro­to­cols.  Those in manda­to­ry quar­an­tine may have to be re­lo­cat­ed al­to­geth­er.  The process of vac­ci­nat­ing per­sons may have to be halt­ed, and air­lift­ing vac­cines to the coun­try may be sus­pend­ed,” he warns.

Dr Rag­bir al­so notes that the vol­canic erup­tion is not just a ge­o­graph­ic event but al­so pos­es so­cial and eco­nom­ic chal­lenges.

“Live­stock can al­so suc­cumb to the many health chal­lenges that hu­mans face, in­clud­ing con­t­a­m­i­nat­ed wa­ter, a short­age of feed­stock, dec­i­mat­ed pas­tures, and sheer aban­don­ment by own­ers flee­ing the dev­as­ta­tion,” he says. 

“The is­land’s tourism sec­tor, al­ready hard-hit by trav­el re­stric­tions aris­ing out of the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic, will be plagued by even more cur­tail­ment of air trav­el, giv­en the vis­i­bil­i­ty chal­lenges posed by the thick vol­canic ash,” he points out. “And agri­cul­tur­al pro­duce, an­oth­er main­stay of the is­land will al­so be lost, due to crops be­ing cov­ered by vol­canic ash.”

The Cu­mu­to / Man­zanil­la MP says this coun­try can­not af­ford to be com­pla­cent in light of what is hap­pen­ing so close by.  He urges gov­ern­ment have a prop­er ac­tion plan in place, should the worst-case sce­nario oc­cur.