The Tribune

By YOURI KEMP

Tribune Business Reporter

ykemp@tribunemedia.net

Bahamian wedding professionals yesterday argued that the COVID-19 vaccination drive will not necessarily succeed in opening up their industry as “the world is 50/50” on becoming inoculated.

Cindy Coakley-Knowles, the Bridal Association’s president said: “With the vaccination stipulation we have to be careful or diplomatic to ensure that we are also not turning away potential visitors who are only tested, and for whatever reason cannot be vaccinated.”

She spoke out after the prime minister yesterday unveiled a further easing of COVID-19 restrictions for weddings. Dr Hubert Minnis, in concluding the budget debate in the House of Assembly, said: “Wedding receptions will now be permitted on New Providence and Grand Bahama, provided that all attendees are fully vaccinated with both doses of the COVID-19 vaccine.

“The hosts of wedding receptions, private gatherings and other social events will be responsible for verifying that guests are fully vaccinated. Hosts and guests will be subject to fines for non-compliance.” This places the COVID-19 compliance and enforcement burden on hosts, who may face a tough task in verifying that all guests are fully vaccinated.

While backing the move as “a step in the right direction”, Ms Coakley-Knowles voiced doubts as to whether this will fully re-open the wedding business following 15 months of COVID-related restrictions due to the stipulation that all attendees must be fully vaccinated. A small percentage of the Bahamian population, just over 25,000, has to-date received two shots to attain fully vaccinated status.

She added: “I’ve been getting mixed reactions from my clients as far as vaccination, so I’m not certain that’s going to make that much of a difference. Persons are still very apprehensive about vaccinations and this is not just about locals because most of my business is destinations as well as my other members. I just don’t know if this will make much of a difference.

“For the month of May to the early part of this month, between the weddings I have done or been involved with, there was only one couple out of eight that were vaccinated. It’s a very low number and these are destination [tourist] couples. So I don’t know if the vaccination clause is going to help us.

“When you’re dealing with destination clientele you can’t control who’s vaccinated or not. We think that just being tested is enough. I think this will help the market. That’s my opinion. We’re just happy to see that the industry is opening and the tourism borders are opening, but again with the other countries having such high restrictions it still hinders us a bit.”

Canada remains closed for outbound travel, which Ms Coakley-Knowles said was hurting the destination wedding business. “We had a couple coming in from Europe and they couldn’t fly directly into The Bahamas, and they had to go through Aruba or some other Caribbean country to get here, but they were determined to come here for their wedding,” Ms Coakley-Knowles added.

“The more the government can do on the whole to make us a lot more attractive as it relates to our controls with the social distancing and all of that, the better for us,” Ms Coakley-Knowles said. “I don’t know how much good pushing the vaccine issue will be for us because the world seems to be 50/50 on that.”