Cruel Coronavirus Pandemic – Part I
As a country we were just stumbling out of a measles epidemic from late 2019 into 2020 when reports of the coronavirus started coming out from China.
By March the National Emergency Operations Centre, NECO, was again activated to take a co-ordinating lead in activities for our protection and safety.
For the next 10 months we struggled to adjust and adapt in some many ways to keep the deadly health threat away – we still are.
The World Health Organisation in March summed up the still unsettling state, post measles epidemic for Samoa in this statement :
With Samoa on the cusp of declaring the end of its measles outbreak, having achieved a 46-day window since the last infectious period of measles and no new cases nor related deaths, the twin-island of approximately 200 000 people is now preparing for COVID-19.
The HEOC, a 40+ multidisciplinary team chaired by Leausa Dr Take Naseri, Director General, Ministry of Health, has been monitoring the global and regional spread of COVID-19 and has put in place several prevention measures.
This includes screening at all ports of entry for persons with flu-like symptoms, tracing their movements from affected countries and providing prevention advice to all inbound and outbound travellers. Various WHO guidelines – clinical, surveillance, patient management, isolation, etc – are also being implemented.
The Ministry also continues to sensitize the public on how to effectively stop the spread of COVID-19 through the adoption of proper handwashing and coughing etiquette. These messages are available on the Ministry of Health website and Facebook pages, TV and Radio.
Sensitization sessions have been held with community leaders and more sessions are planned with other sectors including workplaces and schools.
But making the transition away from what was normal, everyday living to a restricted new lifestyle, led to a host of challenging issues in so many sectors.
The economic sector was the hardest hit and it showed in many ways.
The strain of short opening hours for the business community and limited movements showed up early in the Fugalei produce market.
‘Fugalei Market –Crazy Slow’ was how Newsline Samoa first reported the situation :
A vegetable seller had two words for the pace of business at the Fugalei Market since it took a reeling hit from the coronavirus pandemic emergency lockdown for close to two months now – “Crazy Slow’!
After 20 years of running a vegetable stall, Litia Mikaele, a 68 year old great grandmother from Leauva’a, has never gone through a prolonged drought of worse than poor sales a day.
“Usually when you have a national event like our Mother’s Day this weekend, sales start to pick up a few days out but look around now, there are virtually no one in the place showing any interest in buying my vegetables,” the grandmother watched in disappointment, late yesterday afternoon, Wednesday 6 May 2020.
“As you can see I’m already packed ready to leave with only a bag of sugar and a ‘Twisties packets’ I was able to buy from today’s sales.”
The restricted running hours for buses kept the movements of the public under strict control.
Once again the Fugalei Produce market became the best place to observe how the people tried to fare with the order, authorised as part of the pandemic emergency lockdown.
Newsline Samoa highlighted the struggles and relief by 25-year-old William Tuolo of Falefa village, a regular market vendor.
He was among the hundreds of farmers who sighed in relief when the restricted operating times were extend as restrictions eased up slowly :
For William Tulolo, the ease up on the emergency lockdown restrictions brings an end to 6 hours of cycling before dawn and racing to get home before dusk in the last few days.
He can now catch the bus for a comfortable ride to run his produce stall at the Fugalei Market in the morning.
When it closes at 6.00pm in the evening he is already on the bus again for the weary ride home at the end of the working day.
The huff and puff of cycling for 3 hours each way are over. No more hopping on his mountain bike at 3.00am in the morning to race the clock from his home village at Falefa to get to the Fugalei market by 6.00am in the morning.
The home ride at 3.00pm in the afternoon to get home before it is dark is no longer a worry too.
The determined 25 year old is the main breadwinner for his family, selling an assortment of farm grown produce at the market daily.
Before public transport was allowed to run again this week, he was on his bike 6 hours a day riding back and forth from home to do business.
“ I tried at first to catch a ride into town when the transport ban started but I ended up having to pay and it was getting expensive,” Tulolo looked back to the start of the first two weeks of the emergency lockdown.
“At the end of the day I wandered around to see if I can get a free ride home but I usually end up paying for a taxi.”
He then decided to cut his expenses by riding his bike to the market and back.
The ride on the road in the dark is the difficult part for Tulolo. His fears were not at being chased by the village dogs he rides past but the risk of becoming target practice for stone throwers.
“My farm produce to sell that day are dangled in baskets from the handlebars as I race the clock to be at the market early.
“ After the first few days I started to feel the physical strain I was putting myself through.
“But the worst is after going through all that, the market remains empty with no buyers around and the day ended with hardly any sales.
For William Tulolo, the ease up on the emergency lockdown restrictions brings an end to 6 hours of cycling before dawn and racing to get home before dusk in the last few days.
He can now catch the bus for a comfortable ride to run his produce stall at the Fugalei Market in the morning.
When it closes at 6.00pm in the evening he is already on the bus again for the weary ride home at the end of the working day.
The huff and puff of cycling for 3 hours each way are over. No more hopping on his mountain bike at 3.00am in the morning to race the clock from his home village at Falefa to get to the Fugalei market by 6.00am in the morning.
The home ride at 3.00pm in the afternoon to get home before it is dark is no longer a worry too.
The determined 25 year old is the main breadwinner for his family, selling an assortment of farm grown produce at the market daily.
Before public transport was allowed to run again this week, he was on his bike 6 hours a day riding back and forth from home to do business.
“ I tried at first to catch a ride into town when the transport ban started but I ended up having to pay and it was getting expensive,” Tulolo looked back to the start of the first two weeks of the emergency lockdown.
“At the end of the day I wandered around to see if I can get a free ride home but I usually end up paying for a taxi.”
He then decided to cut his expenses by riding his bike to the market and back.
The ride on the road in the dark is the difficult part for Tulolo. His fears were not at being chased by the village dogs he rides past but the risk of becoming target practice for stone throwers.
“My farm produce to sell that day are dangled in baskets from the handlebars as I race the clock to be at the market early.
“ After the first few days I started to feel the physical strain I was putting myself through.
“But the worst is after going through all that, the market remains empty with no buyers around and the day ended with hardly any sales.
The easing of restrictions on public transport gave much needed breathing space for the bus owners forced into survival mode.
The Evaeva and the Sunrise are among bus services with bigger fleets who offered Newsline Samoa a closer insight into what they were facing at the time :
The Evaeva and the Sunrise bus services are among the ones with bigger fleets, in a struggle to cope with zero earnings, halfway through the 15-day emergency road ban.
Company managers for both bus services share equal concerns for the struggle by drivers and other support workers to provide for their families.
“ We have a fleet of 14 buses out of service with the same number of drivers plus 4 mechanics employed by the company, not including assistants, ‘supakako’,” agonized Samau Solitamalii Samau, company manager of the Evaevea Bus Service
“I do feel strongly for all of them and try to help out because I too have a family to look after, but we have to juggle it together with the company’s financial obligations to the banks,” he added.
Another business sector notably disrupted by the pandemic lockdown restrictions was the fishing community,
The economic waters they found themselves in were unchartered and it was rough going.
Other than Savalalo Fish Market where their side of the story unfolded but it spilled out also onto the side of the roads.
Here is how the early stages went for many in the fishing selling community :
Regular fish sellers at the Savalalo Fish Market are being forced to set up around the roadside to eke out much needed sales for their catches of either tuna or bottom fish.
Most of the sellers have their own fleet of family owned and operated alia or doubled hulled fishing boats averaging from 3 or more that brought in catches during the week.
Tuna sellers Viliamu Chusing of Si’usega and Laga Milo of Puipa’a confirmed the rough passage the local fishing community is going through since health security measures against the COVID-19 pandemic led to the emergency lockdown.
“Mondays to Thursdays are bad days and since the lockdown it has really slowed down except for Fridays and Saturdays when sales pick up but it is not the same as before,” Chusing confessed when he talked to Newsline Samoa at the side of the road at Vaitele.
“Before the pandemic measures were put in place we would normally average about 50 fish sold a day to mostly working people and hotels at the fish market.
“Today we’d be lucky if we sell 5 before the fish market closes so we try to sell on the side of the road and we’ve had days when there are no sales.”