Home quarantine for close associates of COVID patients: Army Commander

The system of removing close associates of those confirmed COVID cases to quarantine centres has been stopped with immediate effect and instead they would be requested to be quarantined at home, Army Commander Lt Gen Shavendra Silva said.

He said that the measures are being taken on the advice of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa who had advised to review the quarantine system followed.

Accordingly, he said that the immediate associates of the COVID positive cases will have to strictly follow the procedures of remaining at home and undergoing the quarantine procedures at home.

Under the system followed so far, if any person was found to be a COVID positive case, all his or her associates were taken to quarantine centres where they were required to remain for 14 days.

However, the system of quarantine at home has been questionable as some of the persons do not strictly follow the procedures and travel out of their homes.

Health officials say that the new method has been introduced as the quarantine centres were running out of space finding it difficult to accommodate more persons.

Earlier in the day Dr Sudath Smaraweera of the Epidemiology Unit said 90 per cent of the beds allocated for the COVID positive cases were already full. He said however, further arrangements will be made to increase the number of beds.