Page 21 - November 2021 IB FINAL

Pacific Health Pacific Health

Source: Official data collated by Our World in Data. For vaccines that require multiple doses, each individual dose is counted. As the same CC BY person
may receive more that one dose, the number of doses per 100 people can be higher than 100.

Australia and other development partners. They had the op- moment in world history. Instead it devolved into an alms
portunity to help with a broader, fairer response, and instead race.
chose the minimal course.
The pandemic response could have been an empowering editor@islandsbusiness.com

“AT 33 YEARS OLD, I FELT LIKE I WAS 90”

Continued from page 15 campaigning during the latest outbreak. Many Kanak families
have also delayed custom ceremonies for their dead because
272,000 people. of a limit on the number of mourners at a funeral.
Last month, New Caledonia’s official Institute of Statistics The number of cases has fallen since the peak in late
and Economic Studies (ISEE-NC) reported that “the number September, but UPM President Victor Tutugoro told Islands
of deaths recorded in September 2021, 1.8 times higher than Business that “even if the health situation has improved com-
the 2015-2019 average, appears to be quite exceptional.” The pared to a month ago, islanders many Kanak and other are in
death rate for September was 144% higher than the average mourning for their dead. Many are still fearful of the virus as
for previous years, and the number of deaths in October was they move around. This is why we wanted postponement of
double that in the five previous years. These deaths and ill- the vote.”
ness have fallen disproportionately on indigenous Kanak and Despite this plea, the French High Commissioner to New
islanders from the Wallisian, Futunan and Tahitian communi- Caledonia Patrice Faure announced on 12 November that the
ties. referendum would proceed – a decision described by the Parti
This wave of cases has complicated preparations for New de Libération Kanak (Palika) as a “political provocation, akin
Caledonia’s third referendum on self-determination under to a declaration of war.”
the Noumea Accord, which is scheduled for 12 December. For As elsewhere in the Pacific, the community response to the
months, independence politicians from the Front de Libéra- global pandemic in the francophone Pacific is complicated by
tion Nationale Kanak et Socialiste (FLNKS) argued that the regional and international geopolitics, with ordinary people
referendum should be delayed until late 2022. Lockdown and bearing the brunt of government decisions.
quarantine measures – including a state of emergency and ban
on gatherings of more than five people – disrupted political nicmac3056@gmail.com

Islands Business, November 2021 21