At the height of the novel coronavirus pandemic rumours began circulating that there was a possible link between 5G Technology and the cause and spread of the virus, and that 5G had, in fact, entered Jamaica in a clandestine way. Both claims were wrong and unfounded.
The Office of Utilities Regulation (OUR) was therefore prompted to issue a media release in April 2020 denying any deployment of 5G in Jamaica and explaining — as other regulatory agencies and experts worldwide have repeatedly affirmed — that there is no connection between 5G and the pandemic. The opportunely was also taken in the media release to underscore the benefits of 5G in respect of facilitating increased productivity, enhanced data handling, providing support for other new technologies, and transforming the country’s digital capacity.
Of note, 5G is a significant evolution of today’s 4G LTE wireless networks. It was developed to meet the very large growth in data and the pressing demands for connectivity in today’s modern society, the Internet of Things with billions of connected devices, and tomorrow’s innovations. In addition to delivering faster connections and greater capacity, a very important advantage of 5G is the reduction of latency (the time taken for devices to respond to each other over a wireless network). As an example, 3G networks had a typical response time of 100 milliseconds, 4G is around 30 milliseconds, and 5G is as low as one millisecond — virtually instantaneous — opening up a new world of connected applications.
With the Fourth Industrial Revolution already upon us, there are implications for the development of new business processes, research, data mining, application of new technologies in health and agriculture, and the development of enhanced consumer experiences; 5G is widely viewed as a key enabler for this development.
