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‘Stringent movement curbs, a must’
Bring in stringent movement restrictions between districts, to close this tap of COVID-19 infections at least now, warned the former Chief Epidemiologist Dr. Nihal Abeysinghe yesterday.
Dr. Nihal Abeysinghe
Dr. Abeysinghe who is the President of the College of Community Physicians of Sri Lanka (CCPSL) said that the essential primary measure is to curb the huge number of infections. The only way to do this is by imposing movement restrictions between districts. The ‘tap’ or source gushing out COVID-19 positives needs to be shut effectively and immediately, otherwise there will be a flood.
On Friday, the health authorities declared that there were 1,914 positive people and 19 deaths.
The secondary measures are increasing capacity of testing, contact-tracing, transportation of the positive people to treatment centres and augmenting the facilities including beds and oxygen at these centres, said Dr. Abeysinghe.
There should also be a dedicated technical spokesperson to explain the actions taken on a scientific basis as it is the right of the people to know what the government plans are and how these plans are decided on.
He also urged people to protect themselves as treatment centres were filled to capacity.