The Government has to consider stricter enforcement and the introduction of new measures, MUMN president Paul Pace told The Malta Independent.

This comes after Malta registered its highest number of daily new cases since the start of the pandemic, with over 300 new cases recorded on Tuesday.

“We are going against the flow of a lot of countries. Despite being one of the countries which has the highest percentage of inoculations, cases are increasing at an alarming rate. In other countries the number of cases has gone down,” Pace said.

“The hospital is full. We have just opened the third ITU. Something needs to happen. We cannot keep on having these high numbers... otherwise it is not only the economy which will suffer, but everything.”

Asked what types of measures he thinks should be introduced, the MUMN president said that "currently people are mixing a lot."

“We believe that illegal parties are taking place… there is something going very, very wrong in the country. But there are also a lot of gatherings happening between families. We need measures addressing these issues. The weather is not helping us, people are mingling."

Pace deems that people are easing off because they erroneously believe that, as the country has the vaccines, there is nothing to worry about. "This feeling – that simply because we have the vaccine we can quickly return to normal… the truth is far from that."

In terms of clinics, Pace said that there has been some movement after stating that nurses were not receiving enough vaccines in clinics to inoculate people around 2 weeks ago.

However, he pointed out that this is not a vaccination issue, as the ITU, instead of being filled with over 80-year-olds, is being filled with people aged between 40 and 80.

The MUMN president said he finds it jarring for the health authorities and the ministry to say that someone died ‘because he had underlying conditions’, as "he would have lived had Covid-19 not affected him or her... you don't hear other countries claiming that."

He also said that it is not enough for the Health Minister to say that people are exhausted with the pandemic. “Measures need to be enforced otherwise it will make matters worse. We can't say simply that 'people are tired' of the pandemic. Measures have to be in place – other countries were also suffering with harsh lockdowns – and it has to come from the government."

"It’s is similar to when you have a child ... you try to sweet-talk them into behaving well, but they aren’t listening, so you need to do it the hard way – which in this case involves introducing new measures and enforcing them."