Number of infected cases exceed 1000

Covid-19: Sri Lanka’s recovery and death rates one of the best in the world

By Sandun A Jayasekera

Chief of Defence Staff and Army Commander Lt. Gen. Shavendra Silva said Sri Lanka’s recovery rate and death rate among COVID 19 patients were one of the best in the world at 56.35% and 1.1% respectively from among a total of 1023 hospitalisations with 9 deaths while in many other countries, it was a total disaster with hundreds of thousands of deaths and millions of infections.   

Our preventive and treatment methods carried out strictly adhering to medical science and community medical systems have been highly successful to keep the COVID-19 death rate to the minimum possible. A total of 9,704 subjected to quarantine at 39 quarantine centres maintained by the armed forces, 9,444 have already left after being tested negative by Polymerase Chain Reactions (PCR) tests. I feel that we are on the right track to win the fight against the viral infection,” General Silva emphasized.   

Mr. Silva added that 98 men and women also left after a 14-day spell of quarantine yesterday. There were 550 Navy personnel, 12 from other forces and three foreign nationals remaining at quarantine centres yesterday   
Commenting on the large number of Navy personnel infected at the Welisara Naval Detachment, General Silva said the Sri Lanka Army has removed nearly 2,000 to Army camps. 

“We did this on compassionate grounds to prevent our heroic Navy soldiers falling victim further to COVID-19. At the Welisara camp, there are about 5,000 Naval personnel and with such a big number of men and women, maintaining the social distance and following other health instructions are not easy tasks. We removed some of them to give more space in the camp and make it easy to follow health instructions,” Mr. Silva noted.   

Meanwhile, the toll of Covid-19 infections in the country rose to 1023 yesterday with the detection of more Naval ratings from the Welisara Naval detachment and one other who had arrived recently from Singapore and remained at a quarantine centre.   

Chief Epidemiologist of the NIID, Dr. Eranga Narangoda said three patients were released from the NIID yesterday raising the number of fully recovered to 569.   

There were no new admissions of patients yesterday to the NIID, he added.   

District wise, there were 150 patients under treatment at hospitals in Colombo, 36 in Gampaha, 35 in Puttalam, 34 IN Kalutara, 13 in Kandy, 11 in Kurunegala, 7 in Jaffna, 5 in Ratnapura, 4 each in Kegalle and Moneragala, 2 each in Kalmunai, Anuradhapura and Matale, one each in Galle, Badulla and Matara, Batticaloa and Polonnaruwa Districts.

• 550 sailors, 12 from other forces and 3 foreign nationals at quarantine centres yesterday
• Our preventive and treatment methods carried out strictly adhering to medical science
• 98 men and women also left after a 14-day spell of quarantine yesterday
• Sri Lanka Army has removed nearly 2,000 to Army camps
• At the Welisara camp, there are about 5,000 Naval personnel