John Briceno is also looking at those youth votes. And, as a businessman himself, he's also trying to appeal to the private sector. He told us yesterday that his approach to COVID 19 and tourism would be to relax the protocol for tourists:
Jules Vasquez, reporter
"Sir, if elected what would be the difference in your approach to Covid-19, would you open tourism fully and abandoned some of the as BTIA has requested?"
Hon. John Briceno, Leader of the Opposition
"We cannot make it so difficult for the tourists or visitors to come to Belize. If you make the process onerous they are not going to come. I believe that the process is over-reached, overkill in what the ministry if health is trying to do in opening up the airport. I believe that we should have opened up the airport since July. We have to be more proactive, we have to use technology, we have to be common-sense approach and I believe that we can do those changes and make it easier for the tourists or visitors to come and for them to be safe and also for our citizens to be safe."
Jules Vasquez, reporter
"Would you continue locking down areas that have outbreaks, would you consider locking down for example Orange Walk right now that has so many cases and increasing numbers? What would be your approach to managing the country were you elected with this covid pandemic nowhere near to an end?"
Hon. John Briceno, Leader of the Opposition
"This is an all-out war against Covid-19. It means that it's not only the public health division should be taking on this fight. It also means that we need to get the private doctors, the private clinics, the private labs to be able to help. If you are Covid positive then we need to do one of 2 things: one, we need to go to your home to find out if you have the facility where you can be isolated and if you do have that then the medical officials need to have a meeting with the family for them to understand isolation means that that person stays in a room by him/her self. The second part to that is that if you go to the home and find out that you do not have the facilities - because you have a lot of people living in the house, you don't have enough rooms - then we need to provide a facility for them. There are a lot of hotel rooms that are empty that people are not using. We can then take over those rooms and put the patients in there."
