One Hin­du Pun­dit has is­sued a call to the Prime Min­is­ter and the Gov­ern­ment to make vac­ci­na­tion against COVID-19 manda­to­ry.

Pun­dit Satyanand Ma­haraj, leader of the Satya Anand Ashram in Aranguez, is­sued the call fol­low­ing re­cent news of the coun­try’s COVID-19 death toll pass­ing the 2,000 mark.

“In light of the re­cent spike of COVID re­lat­ed deaths which is threat­en­ing to col­lapse our health­care sys­tem, I here­by call on Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley to make vac­ci­na­tion manda­to­ry,” the re­li­gious leader states in a re­lease.

“While the world moves ahead to herd im­mu­ni­ty and a nor­mal life, we in Trinidad and To­ba­go con­tin­ue to strug­gle with con­vinc­ing a na­tion to take the vac­cine. It is ev­i­dent that no amount of buff in any amount of press con­fer­ence has made or will make any no­tice­able dif­fer­ence,” he said.

Pun­dit Ma­haraj al­so is rec­om­mend­ing that Gov­ern­ment ap­ply safe zone mea­sures to all of its of­fices and agen­cies.

“To en­ter and do all gov­ern­ment busi­ness you must be vac­ci­nat­ed. This should ap­ply to all gov­ern­ment em­ploy­ees in­clud­ing doc­tors, nurs­es, Min­istry of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty and all who work in the pub­lic sec­tor,” Pun­dit Ma­haraj ex­plains.

“It should al­so in­clude vac­ci­na­tion if you wish to pa­tron­ize gro­ceries and oth­er stores, in­clud­ing all modes of trans­port,” he added.

Pun­dit Ma­haraj says COVID-19 mit­i­ga­tion “can no longer be treat­ed with kids gloves”.

“While every­one’s life is theirs to live reck­less­ly as they wish, the un­vac­ci­nat­ed are con­tract­ing COVID-19 and putting the health care sys­tem un­der such a strain that its col­lapse is im­mi­nent,” the re­li­gious leader warns.