Home Monitoring Device For Repatriated Jamaicans

Prime Minister, the Most Hon. Andrew Holness, says the Government is looking into procuring monitoring technology to effectively facilitate home quarantining of residents repatriated under the controlled re-entry programme.

He said that the Government cannot accommodate all persons returning to the island in a State-operated facility.

“We can’t house all the persons who will come in during this period, and, therefore, home quarantining will be a modality we will have to pursue. We are in the advanced stages of developing a home quarantine monitoring solution that involves the use of monitoring devices and this will be integrated into the JamCOVID-19 mobile app,” he noted.

“We have decided upon it. We identified the supplier. We have done some analytical work on it and we are now moving to procure,” Mr. Holness added at a digital press briefing on Monday (May 18).

He said that further details on how the home quarantining system will work with the use of the monitoring technology will be provided in another week.

Meanwhile, the Prime Minister informed that more than 9,000 Jamaicans, who would like to return to the island soon, have applied through the JamCOVID-19 website at jamcovid19.moh.gov.jm.

The country’s borders were closed to incoming passenger traffic on March 24 as part of measures to control the spread of the coronavrus. As a result, thousands of Jamaicans who wish to return to the island are unable to do so.

The Government has implemented a controlled re-entry protocol, with persons applying through the JamCOVID website.

Meanwhile, the Prime Minister said that more ship workers want to return to the island.

“We have nearly 900 additional Jamaican cruise-ship workers, whom we are working hard to get back home as soon as possible,” he said.

Mr. Holness noted that the challenges being faced with repatriation, and what it brings, are not unique to Jamaica.

“There are over 100,000 ship workers from around the world, who are still on ships trying to get back to their home countries,” he said.

“I can well understand the frustration that the ship workers are facing being in quarantine, some for almost two months, eager to see their families,” he added.