PHILIPSBURG (DCOMM):--- Collective Prevention Services (CPS), in collaboration with the White & Yellow Cross Care Foundation (WYCCF) and the St. Maarten Medical Center (SMMC), successfully concluded World Breastfeeding Week 2025 (WBW 2025) with a series of engaging and impactful events held from August 1–9, 2025 under the theme “Prioritise Breastfeeding: Create Sustainable Support Systems.”

On August 1, an Opening Ceremony hosted by SMMC launched the WBW 2025 activities. On August 2, mothers gathered on the Philipsburg Boardwalk for the Mother’s Walk, creating a vibrant display of solidarity and awareness.

Education sessions were held on August 5 and 6 at Dr. Friday’s Clinic, Women's Health Services, and SMMC, which covered important topics on breastfeeding health and support for new mothers.

On August 7, a Sip & Paint hosted at the SMMC classroom brought together 15 mothers for an evening of art and storytelling, providing a space for creativity, connection, and shared experiences.

On August 8, a Story Time activity was held at the WYCCF in collaboration with the Sint Maarten Library. Eight children, accompanied by their parents, enjoyed animated readings by Melackia Spencer and Maryland Powell of the Sint Maarten Library, highlighting the importance of literacy alongside maternal health awareness.

The week concluded on August 9 with the Mom’s Health Fair, where attendees engaged with over 25 vendors and service providers covering topics ranging from prenatal to postnatal care, childcare, and self-care resources for parents. 

Attendees also heard from notable stakeholders and speakers: Social & Health Insurance (SZV), which outlined registration procedures during pregnancy and subsequent processes.

Orlando-Simon J. Gesner, student midwife under Stichting Building Bridges Saving Lives, discussed postpartum depression, preparation, and when to seek help.

Tadzio Bervoets shared his personal journey as a father and encouraged active paternal involvement.

During the fair, winners from CPS’s annual breastfeeding photo competition were announced: Winner: Inger Van Den Zanden and partner; First Prize: Laura Vialenc-Joseph; Second Prize: Iriesmyra Euson.

This year’s World Breastfeeding Week highlighted the ongoing commitments of CPS, WYCCF, and SMMC to promoting breastfeeding, maternal wellness, and family support in Sint Maarten. 

For more information, the community can view the social media accounts of Collective Prevention Services Facebook Page, Government of Sint Maarten Facebook Page, White & Yellow Cross Care Foundation Facebook Page and the St. Maarten Medical Center Facebook Page.

PHILIPSBURG:---Dr. Dannabang Kuwabong’s new book, examining the work of St. Martin writer Lasana M. Sekou, was launched and presented at international conferences in St. Martin and in Prague, Czechia, this summer.

Titled Rhetoric of Resistance, Labor of Love: The Ecopoetics of Nationhood in the Poetry and Prose of Lasana M. Sekou, the publication is now set as required reading for the Caribbean Theory graduate course at the University of Puerto Rico (UPR) this fall, said Kuwabong.

Published by House of Nehesi Publishers (HNP), the book is possibly the first to critically analyze original writings of how St. Martin people were treated as immigrants in countries and territories in the Caribbean and beyond, from the late 1800s to the late 1950s, said HNP president Jacqueline Sample.

“In this groundbreaking study, Dannabang Kuwabong arouses our critical curiosity, our political consciousness, and our aesthetic sensibility,” said Mark Andrews of Vassar College. “He offers a wide-ranging exploration of the multi-layered and richly imaginative creative works of St. Martin’s leading poet, Lasana M. Sekou.”    

The book’s five chapters offer an in-depth analysis of Sekou’s poetry, fiction, and essays, including Brotherhood of the Spurs, Love Songs Make You Cry, National Symbols of St. Martin, Mothernation, and The Salt Reaper with its mythopoem about the Great Salt Pond.

While “the debilitating psychosocial cognitive effects of poverty and immigration” on St. Martiners is a key theme in Chapter 1, it represents only a fraction of the issues explored in Rhetoric of Resistance, Labor of Love.

Topics like tourism, agriculture, environmental degradation, cultural amnesia, political betrayal, resilience, succession land as a core cultural value, Dutch and French dependency, the fear of and seminal call for independence, and the now challenged historical unity of the island’s people are discussed not lightly or as dogma, but through sociocultural and historical interpretation. These themes are also explored with careful attention to literary quality.

In the book’s “Fanonian Introduction to Lasana M. Sekou,” Kuwabong describes Sekou’s outlook as “revolutionary”—echoing the no-nonsense Trinidadian critic Gordon Rohlehr, who elsewhere called Sekou the “poet and militant publisher from St. Maarten” (2022).

Kuwabong highlights Sekou’s apparent “decision to write to, from, for, and with his people, and not pander to the international gendarmes of literature who play a role in determining the authors from the Caribbean who are academically elevated.”

Another contentious point, Kuwabong writes, is that Sekou’s “liberationist poetics … may not resonate with the pundits of post-colonial literary studies, as Sekou’s combative and counter-discursive poetics are supposedly counter-progressive and out of sync with their contemporary realities.”

Recognizing that Sekou either doesn’t care about what external policing does, says, or feels—or simply refuses to sugarcoat St. Martin’s colonial and divided-island realities—Kuwabong dives headlong into comparisons between Sekou’s work and the profound nationalist themes found in the writings of Frantz Fanon and Edward Said, as well as Patrick Chamoiseau’s complex framing of Caribbean identity.

The St. Martin writer’s pan-Caribbean, pan-African, and internationalist poetry, uncompromising in its critique of class, race, and national, regional, or global structures of oppression, also comes under Kuwabong’s sharp literary lens, particularly in his analysis of Sekou’s works such as Nativity, Maroon Lives, and Book of the Dead.

The final chapter presents the writer as “a witness to national consciousness,” and it is as much about Sekou as it is a signal—a dialogue—with current and future writers and artists from St. Martin and the wider Caribbean.

Kuwabong, who is originally from Ghana, also references earlier “critical appraisals” of Sekou’s work by Fabian Adekunle Badejo (St. Martin), Howard Fergus (Montserrat/UWI), Emilio Jorge Rodríguez (Cuba), and Sara Florian (Italy).

“What’s truly new is how Dr. Kuwabong draws on trauma scholars to rigorously explore, maybe for the first time in relation to Lasana’s work, the Gothic themes and family traumas tied to individual redemption and community healing of St. Martiners, which Lasana writes about in original and sometimes frightening ways,” said Sample.

Kuwabong’s Rhetoric of Resistance, Labor of Love is, overall, “a most timely, insightful appraisal of Lasana M. Sekou’s important body of poetry and prose: a critical assessment of his ecopoetics of trauma and healing to move the people of St. Martin beyond a historical and cultural amnesia, toward liberating forms of community,” said Keith Cartwright, Chair and Professor of English at the University of North Florida. “And beyond St. Martin, charting a mode of witness that urges readers, and calls nations to action.”

“This book triggered the very same feeling I had when I read for the first time the literature of Aimé Césaire, Kamau Brathwaite or George Lamming: revelation and consciousness of Caribbean identity, history, and landscape,” said David Anuar, award-winning writer, historian, and literary critic at the Foundation for Mexican Letters.

Kuwabong is being warmly welcomed by colleagues as he returns with the new scholarly publication for the fall semester at UPR, where he is teaching literary criticism, Gothic and trauma literature, Caribbean studies, and women’s studies.

“We’re delighted to congratulate Prof. Dannabang Kuwabong for the publication of his new book Rhetoric of Resistance, Labor of Love: The Ecopoetics of Nationhood in the Poetry and Prose of Lasana M. Sekou,” said Sargasso, the peer-reviewed journal of literature, language, and culture edited at UPR.

Rhetoric of Resistance, Labor of Love is available at Arnia’s Bookstore in St. Martin, from the author in Puerto Rico, and online at libroslatinos.com, said Sample.

~Letter of intent confirms close collaboration and shared responsibility for security in the Caribbean.~

BRIDGETOWN, BARBADOS:--- Caribbean countries share a lot: a common history, a rich culture and a deep sense of connectedness. They also face shared challenges: persistent gun violence, vulnerability to cyberattacks, and the threat of transnational organized crime. That is why regional cooperation is of vital importance.

 Last week this cooperation was visibly reinforced: the Chief of Police of the Sint Maarten Police Force, Commissioner Carl John, the Chief of Police of the Curaçao Police Force, Commissioner Raymond Ellis and the Chief of Police of the Caribbean Netherlands Police Force, Commissioner Alwyn Braaf, signed – in coordination with their responsible ministers – together with Lt. Col. Michael Jones, Executive Director of CARICOM IMPACS, a letter of intent further strengthening their ties. Jones has long emphasized the need for regional cooperation and stated earlier: ‘The devastating impact of illegal guns in the Caribbean cannot be overstated. Only together can we counter this threat and build safer societies for our people.’

The cooperation does not remain on paper. In June, a five-day forensic training was held in Sint Maarten in collaboration with the Trinidad and Tobago Forensic Science Centre. In September, a new training will follow, this time focused on organized crime and firearms. Steps are also being taken in the field of cybercrime. The Cybercrime Fusion Center in Barbados is supporting the countries in strengthening their digital resilience. In addition, this cooperation will make an important contribution to tackling gun violence, migrant smuggling and human trafficking in the region.

A central element in the agreements is the importance of information sharing. Whether it concerns forensic expertise, digital threats, or cross-border crime: by exchanging data, signals, and analyses, the countries increase their joint effectiveness. For example, the countries will start sharing their watchlists, making it much harder for criminals to move freely across the region. Crucial in this process is timely feedback, enabling the next country to anticipate the arrival of incoming offenders.

During their visit to Barbados, the Police Chiefs were introduced to the facilities of CARICOM IMPACS. They exchanged experiences about their own forces and discussed the cooperation they already maintain within the Board of Chiefs of Police. This existing collaboration provides a solid foundation to build upon.

The role of police leaders from the Caribbean part of the Kingdom in the wider region is visibly growing. For instance, the Chief of Police of Sint Maarten was recently elected First Vice President of the Association of Caribbean Commissioners of Police (ACCP), a recognition of the contribution the Kingdom’s countries make to the regional security structure.

The Caribbean countries are young, but their cooperation is developing rapidly. The letter of intent underscores the shared conviction that only through joint commitment, practical arrangements and intensive information sharing can the region become more resilient against violence, cyberthreats and organized crime. Since last week, a concrete contribution has thus been made to a safer Caribbean region.

PHILIP[SBURG (DCOMM):--- The Collective Prevention Services (CPS) is calling on households and businesses to continue to take their own steps after every rainfall event in eliminating mosquito breeding sites to minimize mosquito-borne diseases, such as dengue effectively. 

This past weekend’s rainfall from Hurricane Erin serves as a reminder that any stagnant water that may have collected in and around homes and businesses should be removed.

Mosquitoes can breed in as little as a half-inch of water.  Source reduction is the key to decreasing the mosquito population. Due to the tropical nature of our climate, breeding habitats are in abundance, and many of them are unfortunately man-made.

Breeding sites include tin cans, old tires, empty paint cans, buckets, old saucers, flowerpots, cemetery urns/vases, old pet dishes, unused plastic swimming pools, boats on dry dock, used food containers, plastic drinking cups, plastic shopping bags, or other containers or plants that collect and hold water.

Source reduction begins by covering, removing, or turning over containers, artificial artifacts, and unused boats that could serve as potential breeding sites. Additionally, it involves properly maintaining the yard and surrounding area by trimming overgrown vegetation. Every resident on the island should comply with the source reduction to have an impact on mosquitoes in the community.

A few tips and reminders: Dispose of any unused pots or bins, or turn them upside down to prevent water collection. Keep trash bins covered. If possible, drill drain holes into the bottoms of unused containers. Conduct a weekly assessment in and around your home and workplace. Also, keep a fine-mesh screen over rain barrels, water tanks, and cistern outlets. Clean your rain spouts regularly to ensure water can flow freely and not become stagnant. Also, properly remove old, unused tires.

Dengue can become a life-threatening illness, and everyone must be aware of the symptoms and take the necessary precautions to prevent further mosquito breeding and transmission.

People become infected with the dengue virus when an infected Aedes aegyptus or Aedes albopictus mosquito feeds on or bites them. Usually, between four and seven (4-7) days after a bite from an infected mosquito, people typically begin to show symptoms.

Persons with dengue may present with a fever, nausea/vomiting, rash, muscle/joint pain (myalgia/arthralgia), headache, retro-orbital pain (pain behind the eyes), and petechiae (red/purple spots on skin).  If you have a fever and two or more of these symptoms, you may be suspected of having dengue.  You should visit your house doctor and be tested for dengue.

In addition to eliminating mosquito breeding sites, use mosquito repellent to prevent the mosquitoes from feeding. Follow the instructions on the product label. Aedes aegypti mosquitoes are attracted to dark spaces and clothing at dusk and dawn. It is recommended to wear light coloured clothing during those times.

To report any concerns with mosquito breeding or for any assistance, contact CPS’s vector control team by phone +1(721) 520-4161, 542-1222/1570, or 914.

Vector control can also be contacted by email at: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.