JavaScript is disabled in your web browser or browser is too old to support JavaScript. Today almost all web pages contain JavaScript, a scripting programming language that runs on visitor's web browser. It makes web pages functional for specific purposes and if disabled for some reason, the content or the functionality of the web page can be limited or unavailable.

Monday, July 7, 2025

Balancing pigtail with healthcare

by

Sheldon Waithe
1363 days ago
20211012
Sheldon Waithe

Sheldon Waithe

A na­tion­al Bud­get is about so much more than the al­lo­ca­tion of funds, the in­tro­duc­tion of new rev­enue streams for the pub­lic purse or the op­por­tu­ni­ty to show where gov­ern­ments have en­joyed suc­cess with its spend­ing over the past year. A Bud­get al­so rep­re­sents the op­por­tu­ni­ty to al­ter be­hav­iours, by set­ting pa­ra­me­ters that will in­flu­ence the pop­u­lace to­wards choic­es that will cre­ate both im­me­di­ate and long-term ben­e­fits.

It can be the tax breaks giv­en to in­dus­tries such as re­cy­cling and re­new­able en­er­gy, while si­mul­ta­ne­ous­ly in­creas­ing tax­es on fos­sil fu­els, to nudge a coun­try to­wards a green­er—and very nec­es­sary —fu­ture. En­twined in every mas­sive Bud­get pre­sen­ta­tion, should be the means to en­sure prop­er in­vest­ment in not on­ly the in­fra­struc­ture of a na­tion, but al­so its peo­ple. Hu­man in­vest­ment.

Un­for­tu­nate­ly, the ‘Pig­tail Bud­get 2022’ falls short on this re­quire­ment. It is a con­tin­u­ance of the ide­ol­o­gy of throw­ing mon­ey at a prob­lem in­stead of tak­ing de­ci­sions with the po­ten­tial for far reach­ing ef­fect, to help fix the prob­lem at its source.

The cur­rent Bud­get boasts the two largest al­lo­ca­tions for Ed­u­ca­tion and Health, which is un­der­stand­able giv­en the need to con­tin­u­al­ly in­vest in our school sys­tem and to al­le­vi­ate the coro­n­avirus stress­es en­dured by the med­ical sec­tor. But when the Bud­get al­so boasts of VAT ex­emp­tions for cer­tain food items whose in­ges­tion will in­crease the fre­quen­cy of vis­its to the same med­ical sec­tor, it begs the ques­tion as to why a gov­ern­ment would give the sec­ond largest chunk of fund­ing to a sec­tor, then place it un­der in­creased strain by en­cour­ag­ing poor choic­es in di­et? It is coun­ter­pro­duc­tive spend.

This VAT ex­emp­tion choice hints at a lev­el of think­ing that is not all-en­com­pass­ing; one choice should ben­e­fit the oth­er as part of an over­all plan to in­crease the well­be­ing of cit­i­zens, in­stead of in­creas­ing the means to med­ical com­plaints. Juice, ketchup, processed food such as canned meat and sausages? When there are fruit and veg­eta­bles, beans and grains, all putting up their hands ‘pick me,’ wait­ing to be made ex­empt? One won­ders if pre-Bud­get con­sul­ta­tion with the Min­istry of Health did not throw up these fac­tors and ring Mr. Deyals­ingh’s alarm bells, be­cause sure­ly there is a long-term plan —this be­ing the 21st cen­tu­ry—to in­crease the health of Trin­bag­o­ni­ans, rather than sim­ply ap­pease the pop­u­la­tion with a de­li­cious ease up. Map­ping out the fu­ture with health and well­ness tar­gets would in­cor­po­rate ex­emp­tions on healthy food, that ex­ist in abun­dance re­gion­al­ly and that can be en­cour­aged to not on­ly be eat­en but grown lo­cal­ly as well. These are the types of pos­i­tive be­hav­iours a 2022 Bud­get should seek to en­cour­age, to gen­er­ate pos­i­tive out­comes and to cre­ate or in­vig­o­rate in­dus­tries that can con­tribute pos­i­tive­ly across the en­tire spec­trum of a so­ci­ety.

If the glob­al sta­tis­tics of 2019 are cor­rect, T&T is al­most at a 19% obe­si­ty rate; that is near­ly a quar­ter of our adult pop­u­la­tion that are plac­ing un­nec­es­sary pres­sure on their or­gans, limbs, ar­ter­ies, as well as a health­care sys­tem that the Min­is­ter of Fi­nance recog­nised as hav­ing had cracks ex­posed dur­ing the pan­dem­ic. Glob­al­ly we share the obe­si­ty is­sue with oth­er na­tions, while al­so shar­ing pro­longed lock­down pe­ri­ods where lit­tle or no ex­er­cise was pos­si­ble, with in­stances of bad eat­ing habits with­in house­holds. As we try to re­open sec­tors and learn to live with the ex­is­tence of COVID-19, this should be a pe­ri­od of in­spir­ing bet­ter and health­i­er lifestyles.

Be­yond the obe­si­ty is­sue, T&T is try­ing to cope with di­a­betes, can­cer, stroke, and a myr­i­ad of oth­er med­ical is­sues, many of which can be re­duced through prop­er di­ets mar­ried to a ded­i­cat­ed push to ed­u­cate about healthy eat­ing. If such a cam­paign could be car­ried out in con­junc­tion with the VAT ex­emp­tion of the same goods that ap­pear in the cam­paign, then the be­hav­iour­al change will oc­cur. It is baf­fling to con­tin­u­al­ly speak of dig­i­tal trans­for­ma­tion year af­ter year while ig­nor­ing the trans­for­ma­tion oc­cur­ring to our cit­i­zen­ry’s bod­ies. Un­like the much sought-af­ter dig­i­tal haven, T&T’s eat­ing habits are not vir­tu­al, they are re­al, and they have dead­ly con­se­quences.

Com­bat­ing the on­slaught of sug­ar, sat­u­rat­ed fats, ar­ti­fi­cial colour­ing and all their un­healthy cousins that bom­bard the glob­al pop­u­la­tion with en­tic­ing ad­ver­tis­ing or tan­ta­lis­ing taste, is tak­en se­ri­ous­ly by na­tions that recog­nise the af­fect up­on the wider so­ci­ety. Pro­duc­tion and work rates are af­fect­ed, in­sur­ance, both na­tion­al and pri­vate, is af­fect­ed. Hos­pi­tal bed­space is af­fect­ed. Mor­tal­i­ty rates are af­fect­ed. We are blessed to have some of the best tast­ing dish­es in (pun most def­i­nite­ly in­tend­ed) sweet T&T but just like the at­tempt to bal­ance the Bud­get books, we must bal­ance de­li­cious­ness with health­i­ness.

A Bud­get that takes a ‘let them cake’ at­ti­tude is the an­tithe­sis of this re­quire­ment and bor­ders dan­ger­ous­ly on dis­dain for the well­ness of the peo­ple. Per­haps the thought process is so fo­cused on pro­vid­ing breaks in an area that is tru­ly in­grained in our psy­che, food, that hu­man well­be­ing is not even on the radar, but this is where the Min­istry of Health’s own ob­jec­tives should in­ter­vene.

By all means have VAT ex­emp­tions on food items as part of the pol­i­cy to of­fer eco­nom­ic re­lief, but for the sake of the na­tion’s health, di­rect it at the cor­rect food items as ev­i­dence of prop­er con­cern for the pop­u­la­tion.


Related articles

Sponsored

Weather

PORT OF SPAIN WEATHER

Sponsored

Today's
Guardian

Publications

The Executive of the National Parang Association 2025-27. Back row, from left: Kervin Preudhomme, assistant secretary; Shaquille Headley, committee member; Cheriese Pierre, committee member; Lisa Lee, trustee; Joanne Briggs, PRO; Yarelis Touissant, committee member; William Calliste, trustee. Front row, from left: Jenais Carter, secretary; Alicia Jaggasar, president; Henrietta Carter, vice president; Joseph Bertrand, youth officer. Missing: Kerrylee Chee Chow, treasurer; Chevone Pierre, committee member.

The Executive of the National Parang Association 2025-27. Back row, from left: Kervin Preudhomme, assistant secretary; Shaquille Headley, committee member; Cheriese Pierre, committee member; Lisa Lee, trustee; Joanne Briggs, PRO; Yarelis Touissant, committee member; William Calliste, trustee. Front row, from left: Jenais Carter, secretary; Alicia Jaggasar, president; Henrietta Carter, vice president; Joseph Bertrand, youth officer. Missing: Kerrylee Chee Chow, treasurer; Chevone Pierre, committee member.

The Executive of the National Parang Association 2025-27. Back row, from left: Kervin Preudhomme, assistant secretary; Shaquille Headley, committee member; Cheriese Pierre, committee member; Lisa Lee, trustee; Joanne Briggs, PRO; Yarelis Touissant, committee member; William Calliste, trustee. Front row, from left: Jenais Carter, secretary; Alicia Jaggasar, president; Henrietta Carter, vice president; Joseph Bertrand, youth officer. Missing: Kerrylee Chee Chow, treasurer; Chevone Pierre, committee member.

The Executive of the National Parang Association 2025-27. Back row, from left: Kervin Preudhomme, assistant secretary; Shaquille Headley, committee member; Cheriese Pierre, committee member; Lisa Lee, trustee; Joanne Briggs, PRO; Yarelis Touissant, committee member; William Calliste, trustee. Front row, from left: Jenais Carter, secretary; Alicia Jaggasar, president; Henrietta Carter, vice president; Joseph Bertrand, youth officer. Missing: Kerrylee Chee Chow, treasurer; Chevone Pierre, committee member.

Jaggasar returns as National Parang president

11 hours ago
Charles Town junior drummers and dancers take to the stage

Charles Town junior drummers and dancers take to the stage

Charles Town junior drummers and dancers take to the stage

Charles Town junior drummers and dancers take to the stage

Jamaican Maroons celebrate, question land rights

11 hours ago
Sherron Harford

Sherron Harford

Sherron Harford

Sherron Harford

Sherron Harford’s holistic mission

to transform the lives of girls

Yesterday
Despite finding out just three days earlier—on December 23—that I had breast cancer, I still got dressed and showed up on December 26, Boxing Day, for a birthday party. I didn’t go to escape the truth. I went to remind myself I was still here, still living, still me.

Despite finding out just three days earlier—on December 23—that I had breast cancer, I still got dressed and showed up on December 26, Boxing Day, for a birthday party. I didn’t go to escape the truth. I went to remind myself I was still here, still living, still me.

Despite finding out just three days earlier—on December 23—that I had breast cancer, I still got dressed and showed up on December 26, Boxing Day, for a birthday party. I didn’t go to escape the truth. I went to remind myself I was still here, still living, still me.

Despite finding out just three days earlier—on December 23—that I had breast cancer, I still got dressed and showed up on December 26, Boxing Day, for a birthday party. I didn’t go to escape the truth. I went to remind myself I was still here, still living, still me.

Nicole Drayton’s breast cancer journey–Fear, faith, and fighting back

Yesterday