so on the other side of the break recording artists curly loxx tells us why he's not so
sure about taking the covid vaccine and he's not the only one so we've got the director of
the rastafari millennium council maxine stowe on Zoom to have a word with folks against the vaccine
morning Maxine welcome to Smile Jamaica it's morning time morning how are you welcome welcome
um tell me how you feel personally about the vaccine if you personally will take it if you
have taken it and why if you would well i i was unsure about it um in the beginning of the
whole you know discussion um in relation to how quickly the vaccine was you know being produced
but then um i did the research on the rna it's a particular type of research that
they've been doing previously um i guess they predictably knew that these types of
viruses would be you know coming on the human population so you know there's always a lot
of research going on behind the scenes but really what um moved me towards um the vaccine protection
is you know my family is in new york and um i saw what was happening in new york city
you know and the impact that it had there particularly particularly on my mother
and you know a lot of people were dying that were close friends um in in the elderly and a lot of
my mother's close friends actually died you know and they died because uh they lived with younger
family and you know she said to me she took the the shot recently too that also impacted on my
you know um thinking uh that she felt that she survived because she was the only one in the
home you know no one was coming in and out okay so i know the seriousness of it um i know that it's
a very complicated and very quick um impact on us but we have to you know figure out the protection
and so it's more like it's more political um decisions that are going on in terms of you know
pharmaceutical companies as you know you know most of the rich countries have you know taken up most
of the vaccines when you see who doesn't even have access to the vaccine you know it's very stark you
know it's very frightening absolutely you know go ahead no no absolutely you're making um a
fantastic point um the question i was going to to ask you because i realized that we might have
some viewers who might be asking you know what is the the rastafarian millennium uh council um yeah
the millennium council actually is a organization that was focused on protecting the intellectual
and cultural property rights of the rest of our community because so much of the culture is being
commercialized without any um benefit mostly you know to the rest of our community but also
changing um a lot of the principles that the community holds there you know so it's an
organization that was formed in 2007 around the ethiopian millennium thus the name millennium
with a an ability to engage into international laws that had been coming in to protect
indigenous peoples and indigenous cultures so it's really you know centered around protecting
and promoting the culture the core cultural rights of the rasatara community okay thank
you thank you why are you concerned about persons in the entertainment industry
why are you concerned about persons in the entertainment industry who
might not necessarily want to take the vaccine
because of the um their impact on a very um suspicious and you know population and
as african people not just here in the diaspora this is happening right across the world
where colonial you know people who have been um subjected to colonial domination and the legacies
are the ones that are actually at risk because you know as in reparations our health has already
been impaired through this legacy we don't trust government and yet now it's a double-edged sword
against us because we are not trusting or researching enough the information to make
you know independent um analysis so are you coming out i'm sorry to jump in but are you coming out
officially and saying that they should take the vaccine yes what i'm saying is that the vaccine
is a is a is a vehicle vaccination is a vehicle to put um antibodies you know to fight disease
what we would like and what had been promoting is the choice um i saw that cuba which i respect very
well the cuban um health system over the years and cuba as a country is developing about four
different um vaccines and i felt that we should have the choice you understand to understand
like okay why can't we get the cuban you know vaccine or be aligned with them or if there are
any other indigenous medicines that we should be taking you know natural medicines to ourselves
because even when the vaccine alone is not going to protect you you're still going to
have to build up your immune system you're still gonna have to live you know with the disease
for a period of time so it's not a cure all it's something that you have to you know
especially in a in an urbanized situation where we live so closely together you know what i mean like
there's so many things that are against us that we you know we need to be thinking deeply not
just reacting you know we are a culture that that are anti-vaccine in general right and maxine allow
me to allow me to to interject for a second we we realize that a lot of our rastafarians are at the
the forefront some of the most recognizable faces within the entertainment industry
and you just mentioned the fact that choice is a very important thing for those that might be
against the vaccine which is completely within their right and their choice do you foresee that
being an issue for bookings and traveling within the entertainment sector definitely it's already
um you know they're having um events now that you have to show that you have been vaccinated
to actually buy a ticket you know what i mean they're they're thinking internationally how
this is gonna roll out so because even though this is happening it's gonna take a year or two
to some kind of normalization so there's gonna be a whole bunch of people who are
vaccinated and there's going to be people who have resisted and so you're already seeing this type of
um what you call it vaccination uh passport not just to travel but to be in close contact with
people because people you know they don't want to have an event and then hear that oh
you know x people got outbreak like you're a super spreader event absolutely have you been vaccinated
not as yet i i mean i don't have any ability to be vaccinated here in jamaica because they just
got a couple doses and you know it's not clear how it's going to roll out and and i am investigating
through the cuban embassy how you know and where that vaccine is aligned and how you know
we can get access to it all right thank you so much for being with us this morning
great to see you and stay safe please god bless all right thank you for having me
director of the rastafarian millennium council maxine store only to say that i know that
the travel world was suggesting that you don't want to say if you don't have a vaccine
you can't travel because there are countries as she just said who won't be vaccinated
even in jamaica we were saying that 65 of the population will be vaccinated in a year
by next march so you're going to have some jamaicans who just won't get the vaccine
and they're saying you can't really stop people from going from one place to one place because
they're not vaccinated so i don't know how that's going to work out but that was a great question
because some people are saying well if you're not vaccinated don't come here right well and that's
and that is that's the delicate um that's the delicate line right there because we're talking
about choice we're talking about people having the right and responsibility and the autonomy over
their bodies to say whether they want to or not but then if we're going to put in infrastructure
and we're going to create systems that basically say hey if you aren't you won't have accidents
someone came out and said you shouldn't do that you don't need a
a vaccine passport to travel because if i decide i don't want it are you suggesting that i can't
leave my country but i but i understand because imagine if you are trying to reset and recover
in terms of as a as a country and you're trying to you know set your economy and everything what
you don't want to do is put in all the efforts and allow persons who you know say i don't feel like
it and then all of a sudden you have an outbreak or you have another pandemic and you have to deal
with it it's a rough it's a rough conversation ah we hear the flip side on the other side
of the break it's a terry tough discussion that interview so come stay with us please