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The Social Democrats addressed Prime Minister Ingrid Šimonytė and Health Minister Arūnas Dulkis. They affirm that the universal quarantine has lasted too long, and criticize the lack of consideration of the social, demographic, economic and epidemiological indicators of specific cities and municipalities.
Orinta Leiputė, a member of the Social Democratic Group, recalled the statistics on coronavirus: {…} We believe that closing the entire country according to a model and not allowing people to move, not act, is not right ”.
Social Democrats have argued that a global restraint measure, also known as a universal quarantine, alone, if applied for more than 3-4 weeks, does not increase the effectiveness of the fight against the development of the virus.
He noted that coronaviruses have seasonal activity and that as their activity peaks in December, January and February, it begins to decline not only because of global quarantine limitations, but also because of the seasonal low tide that begins with this virus. .
According to them, disproportionate limitations in the economic, social and pedagogical process entail potentially greater losses due to their disproportionate application than the desired goal of curbing pandemic threats.
“There was a lack of more trust in people, both people who work in municipalities and doctors, in the spring, now it is not enough. Apparently, one of the results is the bad indicators,” said former Minister of Health Gediminas Černiauskas at the press conference.
Social Democrats have criticized the lack of confidence in the capacity of municipalities to actively address the issue of virus management in their territory or, for example, to establish coordinated action with neighboring municipalities at the county level.
“Neither during the first nor during this quarantine did the central government even try to think about being able to sit down with the municipality and think that in each municipality the businesses are one or another.
Solutions can be found, let’s say the municipality takes responsibility for managing the problem itself: it can decide for itself what, to what extent and to what extent it can be opened. That the self-government must manage the issues in their place, and not just follow the instructions ”, explained the deputy of the Seimas Eugenijus Sabutis.
The vaccination process that has begun is not accompanied by a full explanation that vaccination alone cannot protect us from possible waves of infection unless it is combined with essential biosecurity measures that will be necessary until there are many outbreaks and are lift the global pandemic.
The Social Democrats have come up with an 11-point plan:
1. Grant each municipality the right to decide independently on the application of specific measures, taking into account the scenarios and recommendations of the WHO (including the epidemiological indicators of the municipality): both by introducing entry restrictions into the municipality, an arsenal of biosecurity measures, both mobilizing forces to trace contact with the virus and to isolate or quarantine cases;
2. Urgently develop a national testing strategy using rapid antigen tests at the national level (Rapid antigen test), given that the EC has committed to metro. in April to buy 21 million. tests also. Therefore, Lithuania can already request the additional acquisition of such evidence. Continue with AT-PCR tests, ensuring a sufficient number of tests for all municipalities.
3. Accelerate and expand the use of the antibody testing program, which would allow a more precise identification of the number of people who have already developed and acquired immunity. This would make it easier to plan for vaccine needs and allow people with immunity to continue working. It is necessary to harmonize the identification system of both those who already have immunity and those who are vaccinated, to facilitate the social and economic life of those people who have acquired immunity.
4. Publish a clear communication strategy and information campaign plans both on the vaccination process and on the need to continue complying with biosecurity requirements, taking into account the dynamics of the country’s epidemiological indicators. A communication and information strategy should help our people better understand the need to prevent the virus, but not to shut down the economic, social and cultural life of the country. Agree with the administrators and owners of the media on the presentation to the public of said national communication and information campaign.
5. After analyzing all the outbreaks in Lithuania so far, provide information on those areas of the public and private sector where the outbreaks were most frequent and, based on this, provide possible forecasts of new risks for the outbreaks and their characteristics of management. Based on existing experience, provide potential risk management models to guide all types of businesses, taking into account their specificities, and the public sector, taking into account their specific functions. Involve the population in the management of potential risks and encourage them to actively contribute to the common goal: minimizing outbreaks in a specific area.
6. Using the EC guidelines on viral genome sequencing, urgently join the viral genome sequencing program of the European Center for Communicable Diseases (ECDC) so that Lithuania, together with other countries, reaches 5% of the subject population to genome sequencing tests as soon as possible.
7. Expedite the vaccination program, utilize ECDC’s electronic vaccine reserve system in an effort to increase the order of doses of existing and newly licensed vaccines that our people need. Plan and adjust the national vaccination schedule now, taking into account the characteristics of the vaccines and the possible seasonality of vaccination. Till March. 80% of the medical and social and pedagogical staff, as well as 80% of people over 75 years of age, have been vaccinated at the end of
8. In accordance with all companies and industries, establish an IT platform to facilitate the introduction of anonymized QR (fast answer) a system that can facilitate contact tracing where the risk of infection is high. A unified case accounting system must be set up to track the contacts of a potentially infected person.
9. Enter into an agreement with the associated business, industrial and union structures on the division of responsibilities for the management of a pandemic, establish the mandatory compliance of biosafety measures by each entity in the labor market and establish responsibility for non-compliance of said obligations. It is up to each municipality to supervise compliance with these specific biosecurity measures.
10. Make the decision as soon as possible to return the children to schools and kindergartens by allocating additional financial resources for the acquisition of biosecurity measures, ensuring sanitary and hygienic conditions and the application of social security standards in those institutions.
11. Provide the Seimas during the spring session with information on the effectiveness of the universal quarantine measures applied, their consequences for human health (both mental and physical), household income, preservation of employment, dynamics of domestic violence and others indicators. Present to the Seimas and the plans envisaged for granting financial support to families.
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