The Dominica Port Authority (DPA) Chief executive officer Benoit Bardouille said that several stringent measures are being put in place to ensure that the COVID-19 pandemic does not affect the island's cruise ship season that opens in June.
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“During the summer when we will be getting ships from June… we will have to do a couple of things. We will have a new health screening area on the pier, so when the people come off the vessels they will be screened,” he said.
"Only persons who are going on pre-sold tours will be allowed out. In the past, people could walk off the ship and go into the city and move on their journeys. Now you will not be able to do that."
Over the last year, the pandemic has severely affected tourism, which is the main source of income for this Caribbean island. However, its authorities expect that this economic activity will begin to pick up again in the next month.
On Friday, Dominica reported that it has no cases or deaths linked to the virus and that the 175 cases registered since the first case was detected in March 2020, have all recovered.
On April 6, Dominica received 28,800 doses of COVID-19 vaccines through the COVAX Facility. In early February the Government of India supplied Dominica with a gift of 70,000 of its Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccines after Prime Minister Roosevelt Skerrit had requested access to the shots on January 19, 2021.
To date, Dominica has administered at least 18,864 of thefirst dose of thevaccineandaround 13,144 people are fullyvaccinatedwithtwo doses.