Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley says Car­ni­val 2021 has been can­celled. The rea­son the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic.

Speak­ing at the Hy­att to­day, the prime min­is­ter said it will be mad­ness to stage what has been dubbed the great­est show on earth while the coro­n­avirus re­mains.

He said, "Gen­tle­men in 72 hours we'll be in Oc­to­ber and if at this time in Oc­to­ber we are still in the throes of a pan­dem­ic it will be mad­ness to be talk­ing about car­ni­val in Feb­ru­ary. I see no fu­ture for Car­ni­val in Trinidad and To­ba­go in the months ahead and to­day I could put every­body on no­tice that un­less there's some dra­mat­ic wind that will blow across us where by Christ­mas the pan­dem­ic would be a thing of the past Car­ni­val in T&T in 2021 is not on. "

Dr Row­ley added, "Pic­ture Jou­vert morn­ing but with the coro­n­avirus still a ma­jor is­sue not on­ly in T&T but in the world around us it's just not on. Let us be thank­ful that we are still alive to see each oth­er's face. Let us re­mem­ber what our coun­try passed through in 1918. Let's us un­der­stand what is hap­pen­ing in coun­tries abroad that have not been able to con­trol the spread among its pop­u­la­tion. And in those ex­am­i­na­tions and re­view, a car­ni­val which is the per­fect en­vi­ron­ment for the spread­ing of the virus is not some­thing that we can en­counter (ac­cou­trement) at this time."

Prime Min­is­ter Row­ley said, "This de­ci­sion will have se­ri­ous eco­nom­ic knock-on ef­fects, things that we will lose in terms of the econ­o­my. But by the same to­ken, we can­not hope to gain on that swing and die on the mer­ry go round."