Workers at Yates Associates – the construction company on Virgin Gorda which has been at the center of a large COVID-19 cluster – stand to be impacted both mentally and financially as result of the alleged protocols which have been implemented on the entire organisation.
This is according to Managing Director of the company Chris Yates who told our news station in an invited interview on Monday September 27, that her entire company of approximately 120 workers, was forced to cease operations following the discovery of positive cases among workers.
Yates said that the positive cases discovered were in one particular living area where 31 workers out of approximately 43 tested positive for the virus.
However, she said that the other 70 plus workers who live in other areas distinctive from the location of the positive cases, were all told to isolate despite not being tested for COVID.
“My opinion is that the government is panicking. There are 15 other cases that we know of in Virgin Gorda, this virus didn’t drop from the sky. My workers caught it from somewhere. They do go out on weekends, they’re adults, they go wherever they want to go and I’m assuming somebody picked up the virus somewhere. They haven’t been traveling anywhere to bring it in from abroad,” the managing director stated.
Yates added, “So, it was obviously picked up in the community somewhere and spread like wildfire. We did contain it from the minute we realized we’ve had some cases. We did contain it and some of the guys working were told to stay in their area and we provided them with food.”
Told to isolate for a total 21 days before testing
According to Yates, she was initially informed that testing would have been conducted on the remaining 70 plus employees on day 8 of isolation which was on Saturday September 25, to determine their COVID status.
However, she said that she was later informed that the untested employees would have to be isolated for an additional two weeks which would equate to a total of 21 days of isolation before being tested for the virus.
She said, “The government was talking about testing these people on Saturday and we were all prepared that okay we’ll be tested on Saturday and then we’d know, yes, we got something or no, we don’t. I mean, it’s 8 to 9 days after the first case was discovered so it’s time for it to be incubated or whatever. But what they are saying is now they rather instead of testing us now, they want to wait two more weeks to reach 21 days after and I think that just doesn’t make sense to me.”
“So we’re all locked up for two weeks, not knowing whether we’ve got it or not. Several of us have taken the rapid test because we have the rapid test and we know that we’ve come out clear, but still, we’ve got to stay in quarantine for two more weeks,” she added.
Seems like two standards.
Yates said this policy is one that she could not understand, as 93 percent of his staff is fully vaccinated and having all her workers isolated for some 21 days and not being allowed to be tested is not right.
The managing director said similar to the protocols in place for tourists who once testing negative are allowed to freely roam the territory, her workers who were not in contact with the positive cases should be allowed to be tested and continue their daily lives similarly.
$250,000 loss at minimum
Yates questioned whether a similar stance would be taken for any other local business with positive cases to be forced to close all its operations despite 110 of 120 persons being fully vaccinated.
The Managing director said such a decision not only impacts the business financially but also the workers mentally. She said her company at minimum over the two-week period stands to lose more than $250,000 which would also impact the workers and their families as they are only paid for work conducted.
“These are workers that are here, you know, and just the fact that they don’t know when they see so many of their fellow workers are found positive. And the virus is frightening to a lot of people, I think that is more than the economical. It hurts the workers the fact that they get paid for building something rather than workers that are sitting in an office all day like the government where it’s government business so it’ll get done whenever. With the building you have to build the building to get paid to get your wages. It’s a difference between government and private enterprise,” she explained.
“It’s the workers that suffer, the business suffers somewhat yes, but the business has ways of recovering because it doesn’t have as much outgoing. It’s not paying out the wages so yes, it’s losing a profit, it’s losing income and it gets behind on its project. So, we may have to pay all the time in the future to catch up and it hurts that way, but the main thing is the workers that don’t get paid because they’re not producing and companies can’t afford to pay them after 18 months of COVID,” Yates further stated.
She said the company is presently operating on its reserves which are presently low, after battling with the COVID-19 pandemic for more than 18 months.
284 News also attempted on several occasions to contact Chief Medical Officer Dr. Ronald Georges to get his comment on the alleged protocol. However, we were unsuccessful up until the publication of this article.