Sinn Féin leader Mary Lou McDonald refused to rule out locking down the entire island of Ireland over the Delta variant during an interview this week.
Speaking to RTÉ during the Six One News, McDonald was asked about how the country should respond to the Delta variant.
“Before Christmas, when we saw the rise of the UK variant, the Alpha variant, Sinn Féin was calling for the whole island to be shut down, for there to be no travel,” said presenter Catríona Perry.
“Is that something you think we should see again now with the rise of the Delta variant?”
McDonald was evasive on the question.
Mary Lou McDonald refuses to rule out support for a complete shutdown of the whole island in response to the #DeltaVariant, and gives the impression that her only problem with tyranny is if it's not well enough organised. #SinnFein #indoordining #disbandNPHET pic.twitter.com/vCLEKDoSVT
— JRD (@JRD0000) June 29, 2021
“Well look, we need to be ever vigilant,” she said.
“We have always said that we need to have a capacity and a plan around quarantine, and around keeping the population safe. And of course that moves with the times, because it’s not just the variants of the virus that you have to take account of, it’s also the extent of vaccination and the achievement of herd immunity. So all these factors need to be weighed.
“The ultimate position needs to be to keep people safe, but above all else, Catríona, after the year and a half that people have had, the least people deserve is clarity.”
Despite calling for clarity, at no point did McDonald offer it herself on the question of whether Sinn Féin would or would not shut down the island over the Delta variant.