I really want us to have a sincere and nuanced conversation about the alcohol ban.

I want to invite you into a short thought experiment.

Suppose you're a single parent who works in an alcohol retailer. You get paid per shift. You haven't worked since December...

...the next prospective date you might be able to work again is on 16 February. Your has to go back to school on 15 February. You haven't yet bought them any stationery, uniform, you haven't even paid registration fee let alone school fees yet.

How are you surviving the month?

The government doesn't consider you unemployed so you can't claim UIF and neither can you claim the R350 relief grant.

You cant lean on family to help you out because many of your family members have lost their sources of income too?

Suppose you're an owner-truck driver in the alcohol industry. You business has been interrupted for 15 weeks and you have 4 more weeks of no work (total 5 months)

For the last couple installments you haven't been able to pay your bank loan installment for your truck.

You're about to miss another installment at the end of this month. The banks are threatening to repo your truck. You will literally lose your livelihood.

Over the last 8 months you've lived off of personal loans to cover your bills whenever there has been an alcohol ban.

You're about to default on those personal loans.

What's your next move? What will you be doing? How are you surviving?

These stories aren't just isolated anecdotes. There are literally hundreds of thousands of people in SA who are currently living through this.

People who are now trapped in vicious cycles of debt and sinking deeper into poverty every day as this ban continues.

This is the impact of short sighted policies on the lives of people. The alcohol ban has unintended consequences that the government has no means of being able to mitigate other than by lifting the ban.

But they fear COVID will rapidly spread when they lift the ban

The spread of covid (related to alcohol) can be mitigated through other means.

If we don't want people to attend super spreader events then we should ban on-site consumption of alcohol. Allow for at-home consumption.

That way we avoid people congregate at parties.

It's not ideal for the industry but it's still a whole lot better than having the entire industry shut down.

With a curfew in place and strict regulations against consuming alcohol outside of your home, the spread of COVID would be significantly mitigated

So why is government holding on to a ban plunging people into poverty when it has absolutely no way of financially assisting those people.

Lift the alcohol ban @CyrilRamaphosa... Replace it with restricted sales and consumption. Monday to Thursdays with only at-home consumption

I wrote a more nuanced column about the details of the policy on the ban. https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/opinionista/2021-01-17-the-alcohol-ban-is-a-policymaking-blunder-that-has-to-be-corrected/

A lot of people seem to be saying that the ban is suppose to give temporary relief in hospital trauma units

Except, covid is going to put our trauma units under immense pressure for thr next 3 to 5 years

It will take us about 5 years to vaccinate enough people for herd immunity