COVID-19 Govt. has the resources, capacity to control the pandemic: Bandula

By Sandun A. Jayasekera   

There is no second wave of Covid-19 pandemic in Sri Lanka and the government has the resources, capacity and a strategy to fully control the escalation of the viral infection originating from the Kandakadu and Senapura rehabilitation centres, Cabinet Spokesman and Minister Bandula Gunawardana said yesterday.   

Addressing the weekly Cabinet news conference yesterday, Minister Gunawardana said President Gotabaya Rajapaksa briefed the cabinet on Wednesday on the measures taken to contain the detection of Covid-19 positive cases from two rehabilitation centres at Kandakadu and Senapura.   

“The number of Covid-19 cases tested positive at Kandakadu was one-third of the Covid-19 infections found at the Welisara Navy camp. The health authorities and security officials did a great job in controlling the spread from Welisara Navy camp and restricted the number of deaths to 11. As such the Health and Military officials have already taken steps to keep the spread of the viral infection under control,” Minister Gunawardana stressed.   

He said the issue of lockdown, closing of schools, imposing of curfew or shutting down of state and private sector establishments does not arise as suggested by certain organisations and individuals and added many countries in the region like Pakistan, India and Bangladesh were in a worse situation in terms of the number of infections and deaths than Sri Lanka.   
The health guidelines and protective measures to ensure a smooth conduct of the Parliamentary polls were handed over to the Health Ministry by the Elections Commission will be gazetted in the next few days, Cabinet spokesman and Minister Bandula Gunawardana said.