 Welcome to NTN Nightly. I'm Huma Di Mark. This edition stops stories. Early childhood sector to undergo face reopening. Local cruise sector service providers enthusiastic about resumption of calls to the island. And the local emergency medical personnel are trained to operate advanced equipment donation. The Department of Education, Innovation and Gender Relations through its Early Childhood Services Unit have been working collaboratively with local health authorities to ensure the safe reopening of the early childhood sector on the island. Officers from the Department of Environmental Health have been conducting island-wide inspections of the various early childhood centres to ensure compliance to the guidelines provided in collaboration with the St. Lucia Bureau of Standards. The early childhood sector will reopen on a phased basis. With all approved private sectors resuming operations on Tuesday 6 April 2021, government-operated centres will reopen their doors on Monday 19 April 2021. Only centres which have met the approved guidelines and demonstrate a sense of readiness to receive children in a safe and conducive environment have been granted approval to reopen. The Early Childhood Services Unit commends the administrators and staff of the various early childhood centres for their patients and efforts in ensuring that all the stipulated protocols are in place at their centres to ensure the safety and well-being of the children in their care as well as the staff and parents. The unit welcomes the reopening of the centre and urges all early childhood practitioners to remain alert and vigilant and ensure total adherence and maintain all of the COVID-19 guidelines which govern the operations of the centres. Teachers and educators in early childhood education from across the Karakum community are involved in a four-week training workshop to ensure their capacity to deliver high-quality distance learning experiences for young children. More from Karakum News Times to Sankin English Francis. The workshop commenced on Wednesday, 17 March, through a partnership among the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization UNESCO, the Karakum Secretariat and the Caribbean Child Development Centre of the University of the West Indies, UWI Open Campus. Concluding on the 7th of April, the free online workshop explores topics including how to help parents to support their children during home-based learning, expectations for teachers and children, the appropriate time frame for children's attention span and how to keep children engaged during online learning. Speaking during the virtual launch event, Dr. Loret Bristol, Program Manager for Human Development at the Karakum Secretariat, underscored the importance of high-quality early childhood education in the growth and development of individuals. Regionally, a great deal of attention has been paid to the upper levels of the basic education sector, particularly the examination classes. And we all know why, because there was anxieties around how do we continue education to fulfill transitions for higher levels of learning. But we also know, and you know as well, because as practitioners in the early childhood development sector, you understand deeply and appreciate that the ECD, the Early Learning Years, is a foundation. And we know that our homes is only as strong as its foundation. Dr. Farrell Khan, Program Specialist for Education at UNESCO's cluster office in the Caribbean, in her remarks at UNESCO is taking steps to prioritize early childhood education and care in the COVID-19 response. This training is conceptualized to provide hands-on skills for frontline practitioners. We have identified early childhood development or ECD as a priority area based on a number of considerations. First of all, from the global and regional experience in the overall COVID-19 response, the early childhood education and care sector has not been adequately prioritized in spite of its fundamental significance to one's life. Fully aware of this fact, UNESCO has recently organized high-level and technical dialogues to advocate for early childhood development and care as a priority area for COVID-19 response. Speaking at the opening, head of the Caribbean Child Development Centre and director of the Concertium for Social Development and Research of the University of the West Indies, Miss Cecile Menot, said the University is pleased to be associated with the incredible partnership with Caricum and UNESCO. It was only too much our pleasure for us to say yes, we would definitely be able to do this with you. One of the big surprise, we had to keep it within 40 and you will understand why when your facilitators speak to you because it is a workshop setting. It is not a seminar, it's not one where you will be talking. This is very participatory. In the fine style that open campus operates because we are an online institution, we've been able to work together and come up with skills and strategies as to how we could do this. So you are in very capable hands with my colleagues as they share with you some strategies and some things to help you in your environment, in your different countries. March 16th, 2020, registered the last commercial cruise call to St. Lucia amid the global COVID-19 pandemic. Tourism authorities recently announced preparation for the possible reintroduction of the cruise ships to Port Castries this summer. While efforts for seamless operation are being made by local authorities, noting that dormancy of the sector over the last year has left a deep impression. Much hope has been expressed by ancillary service providers. More in this report. Noting the last cruise call on March 16th, 2020, there has been minimal activity at Port Castries. The announcement of St. Lucia's preparation for assumption of operation within the cruise sector in mid-July has been noted by ancillary service providers who state that stagnation of cruise activity over the last 12 months have left them cash-strapped but optimistic. We have one tour going out based on hotel only. So the cruise industry has affected us tremendously. And we are excited to hear that soon that it will be starting up again. I think it's going to be a great thing for us here because a lot of solutions including myself and the persons I work with, we...this is what we do. We are beyond elated and everyone is anticipating that as soon as this happens things are not necessarily going to return to normalcy but at a minimum we are going to find ourselves creeping towards that. So we are excited. The last few months, feels like an entire year, was indeed a challenge. And so the news and the efforts of the command centre, the Ministry of Health and Tourism as well as the Government of St. Lucia in general, the efforts have been phenomenal and commendable. We lost a lot of our business that normally came in during the period, especially during the winter months whereas our busiest period. But it has a significant impact on everybody including Cox and Company and a lot of people who benefit from the cruise industry as well. And we hope that things will turn around and I'm very confident that the future looks strong for the industry and we should see cruise ships return in during the summer and then the winter season will pick up. From all indications, next year is looking to be a fairly strong year and 2023 is going to be an even stronger year for the cruise industry. Taxi drivers, although certified for operation, have had little to no income over the months, expressing what seeing a vessel return to port castries would be like. My name is Constantius Francois. I'm the Vice President of Holiday Taxi. I'm indeed elated to hear the return of the cruise setter. The cruise ship industry is very important to our shareholders and for some of them, that's the only place they earn a dollar is at the cruise ship. And I think you would understand how difficult it has been for the past year. The St. Lucia Solid Waste Management Authority is a major ancillary service provider to the cruise sector. The hauling of waste from the port to the disposal site is critical for continued operations and the environment overall. Managing Director Justin Sealy expressed his views on the advent of cruise tourism. The St. Lucia Solid Waste Management Authority's operating budget depend on the head tax to the tune of about 35 to 40% of that budget. With that shortfall, which equates to about $400,000 per month, the authority was severely limited in what could have been undertaken. This resulted in lack of remediating of illegal dumps, removal of derelict vehicles and other activities like that. With the reopen of the cruise industry, these activities could be undertaken again. With Celebrity Millennium scheduled to make her initial voyage of the season, in mid-July, a committee has been established to chart the way forward on welcoming the return of cruise tourism and minimizing any possible risk of COVID-19 to local communities. It must be noted that the health and safety of the nation is of paramount interest and that cruise visitors will not be permitted to certified sites and attractions on the days designated for locals and on-island guests to proactively avoid commingling. With the cruise sector impacted, thousands of jobs have been compromised. Consultation commenced last week with positive input from the Vendors Association and will continue with all sub-sectors. For the Government Information Service, I am Jesse Leance reporting. The Substance Abuse Advisory Council Secretariat recently held a panel discussion to educate the populace on the impact of alcohol abuse and other controlled substances. This comes after a stream of social media posts depicting the high level of alcohol use and dependence among St. Lucian's. Statistics from the World Health Organization on the global consumption of alcohol indicates St. Lucian's consumption levels are above the global average. And if you look at alcohol per capita consumption in 15 and over in liters of pure alcohol, St. Lucian males 26.1, the global average 19.4. Females 9.3, the global average 7. Pointing out that we are consuming more alcohol than the global average. We are drinking more than other people in this world. In addition to that, people who abstain about 50% of St. Lucian's actually are currently using and 50% are not. 50.3% are not abstaining. The global average is actually about 35% of people that are currently consuming. Dr. Stephen King says the statistics show 69.9% of the male population practice heavy episodic drinking or binge drinking. That number is 33% in the female population. People need to understand that how you drink, how much you drink, how often you drink is crucial for your health, short-term and long-term. And the multiple ramifications. We're talking about physical disease, mental disease, social disease because of your drinking. During the discussion, it was highlighted that the use of alcohol can lead to impaired judgment or reckless behavior. Corporal Anne Joseph says, as it pertains to crime, being under the influence of alcohol is not an excuse. I think sometimes people believe that you're going to get a whole pass, so to speak. If you use alcohol, the police believe you're drunk. They'll just say, oh, that person was drunk. There's no excuse in law. It actually makes it worse for you if you are intoxicated because there are sentencing guidelines that there are aggravating factors like the abuse of alcohol. It will actually adversely affect you. Dr. Naomi Jabat is a consultant psychiatrist at the National Wellness Center. She says, while treatment is imperative to those who suffer from alcoholism, there are barriers. Because a lot of people, they're comfortable with the use of alcohol and they don't think it's a problem for them. So you think it's a problem because you see the way it's been affecting their family and everybody else, but as far as they're concerned, they're okay. They're comfortable with it. They like alcohol. And I saw a lot of videos that were going around on WhatsApp after the alcohol was released, after we had the two weeks' tints of no alcohol. And you could see people, like, they were so happy and insulting everybody and everything, like, they don't realize that they have a problem. Everybody else does, but they don't realize. The panel discussion aired on NTN analyzed the impact of alcohol abuse from a medical, psychological and legal perspective. Platinum Ambulance Services, a leading specialist private ambulance company in the United Kingdom, has deployed a training team to St. Lucia to complement their donation of ambulances and medical equipment to the St. Lucia Fire Service. Emergency medical technicians began training with them on Wednesday, 31st March, 2021, at the Kokopam Hotel. Local Fire Service Chief is Joseph Joseph. Platinum Ambulance Service donated a contentment of equipment and they're also donating three ambulances to St. Lucia. And the equipment on board is a little more advanced than what we already have in St. Lucia. So the objective is to provide the necessary training for our EMTs to use that advanced equipment and of course to boost the efficiency in our response to emergencies. Paramedic and Director at Platinum Ambulance Services, Sophia Burrell says training for the local fire service EMTs will primarily constitute medical training for trauma, obstetrics, illness and the use of the advanced equipment that they are donating. We're bringing over equipment, the predominately the most important bit of equipment that's so exciting is called a life pack 12 and it helps you so that you can do EKGs or ECGs as we call them in the UK. We take, we look at 12 different aspects of your heart and diagnostically we can tell if you're about to have a heart attack or if you're currently having a heart attack or if you're not going to have a heart attack hopefully. It also has got an AED in it as well so it's got enough electricity in it to light up an entire football stadium for two seconds so that we can stop your heart and hope that the natural rhythm will start to take over it. It can measure your oxygen saturation levels, it can take your blood pressure, it can do your end tidal CO2 and we're going to teach your students how to recognize all the different rhythms that we're going to pick up so it's going to be quite a long week for them but hopefully they're going to become top guns when they finish. Additional training includes emergency driver training and community first responder training of which the Royal Saint Lucia Police Force will also benefit. Iranias Henry, like the other 20 trainees, look forward to the coming days of impartation. It's not that we are not proficient in our skills but most of the skills, since we are using mostly American equipment and the equipment we are getting there are sort of British and also the instructors are British so most of the skills we are learning from a British perspective so that's just it and we are learning some more advanced techniques. It's not that we are not all that proficient in what we do just that we are learning more advanced techniques to make us more effective in our duties as ENTs and to bring us up to an advanced level. The training will culminate next week Friday. The generosity of Platinum Ambulance Services is made possible through the High Commission of Saint Lucia in London. This is NTN Nightly. Up next, Primus Hutchinson with the NTN novella Quayall. One of the eight universally recognized rights of the consumer is the right to satisfaction of basic needs. This means that every consumer has the right to basic goods and services that guarantee survival. This right includes adequate food, clothing, shelter, health care, education, water and sanitation. Welcome back. We join Primus Hutchinson for the NTN novella Quayall. Thank you very much. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen, from the University of Saveleté for the information of the government of the CIS, the National Television Agency of NTN, and the new president of the Quayall, Primus Hutchinson. The government has made a decision to limit its editors who are from the West or the West in order for the public to come to the end of this week. This is a consequence of the number of corona cases that have increased since the holiday season to the end of this week. This is also why the government has established this arrangement for its editors who can continue to operate under COFU. According to the Chief Officer of Communication Affairs in the office of the Prime Minister, Nicole McDonald, I started the first in May 2020 when COFU started at 7 a.m. to 4 a.m. I started the second in May 2020 when COFU started at 7 a.m. to 4 a.m. Somdegloria started at 6 a.m. to 4 a.m. Dimash Park, the fourth in May 2020, started at 3 a.m. to 4 a.m. to 4 a.m. I started the sixth in May 2020 when COFU started at 3 a.m. to 4 a.m. I started the sixth in May 2020 when COFU started at 4 a.m. According to McDonald, the main reason is to try to reduce the number of COVID-19 cases so as not to eat and pay. The government has been very concerned about preserving certain purposes and trying to manage the good activities that could be paid to the country. The head of the communication office said, I understood that the amount of money that was paid to the country was more than enough to finish the week on a holiday. McDonald said, it's only for us that we have a good time and the exam is if we all cooperate to reduce the number of COVID-19 cases. So, to cooperate and to pay for the government also to do a successful job. It's full of corporate companies with the best accessibility that is more concerned about health protection. Health, even health, especially here, in general. Last week, tourist authorities announced preparations to be able to keep the opportunity to take the opportunity to take the opportunity to take the opportunity to take the opportunity to take the opportunity to take the opportunity to take the opportunity to take the opportunity to take the opportunity to take the opportunity to take the opportunity to take the opportunity to take the opportunity to take the opportunity to take the opportunity to take the opportunity to take the opportunity to take the opportunity to take the opportunity taxi west in San Yon Saleh for the rest of the year. The authority of the management of this city is very important for the tourism sector in the country, like the people who have deposited all this money, including the tourism sector in this city. I have a lot in place to visit this city. This is Amita Madjouyet, the general committee who is in place to come to this touristic city with the same leader to seriously reduce the possibility of COVID-19 to affect this community. For example, the tourists from Cai have visited the city who have certified to pay the same amount of money. I have also started to associate to this touristic city to be able to affect the economy. Before we finish, I would like to make a test of COVID-19 to see if it is possible to travel as much as possible to make it possible to work as a commander. I would like to inform the public that if the editor of this touristic city wants to know who will be finishing the course in Gosele I would like to say that the second touristic city has 8 stages for the media for example, the third touristic city has 8 stages for the tourism sector for the media. Dimash, the fourth touristic city has 8 stages for the media and the sixth touristic city has 8 stages for the media. For the respiratory clinic for the fire department there are 4 stages for the tourism sector for the women the third touristic city has 8 stages for the women Dimash the fourth touristic city has 6 stages We are going to do a test to see if we are able to visit the clinic that is available in the United States to make it possible for us to come here. We are going to take a look at the clinic, the respiratory clinic, and the clearing. and also to be able to finish the work in a week or so. So, everyone who works in this field can go out and have a good time. The hospital is very busy and it continues as it is. That's all. I'll see you again next time. Thank you very much for watching. I'll see you again next time. I also consider that I'll see you again next time. See you again next time. Thank you. Messier Field Primers. That brings us to the end of NTN Nightly. Join us next time at 7pm with a repeat at 7am. You can also catch up with us anytime on the Government of St. Lucia Facebook page or YouTube channel. I'm Hermione Ma.