12 June 2020 12:02 am
By JAMILA HUSAIN
Sri Lanka faces no threat of a re-emergence of the COVID-19 within the society, better known as the ‘second wave’ faced by some countries as there has been no public transmission of the virus reported since end April and all health guidelines continue to be strictly in place, Deputy Director General of Public Health Services Dr. Paba Palihawadana told the Daily Mirror yesterday.
She said the spread of the virus was well contained within the quarantine centres and even the spread within the naval camp was ‘almost over’.
“Sri Lanka is not under any threat of a second wave. As we can now see the matter is well under control as of now. Of course strict health guidelines will have to be maintained and the public will have to maintain social distancing and all the other rules laid down by the Health Ministry. But there has been no case reported among the public since late April and even within the naval camp, the threat is almost over,” she said.
Patients repatriated from overseas also had not recorded a different or severe form of COVID-19 and they were being treated successfully by local doctors here. Dr. Paba explained that Sri Lanka was geared to treat more possible patients among those repatriated in the future as all adequate facilities were in place.
Another official from the Health Ministry said that despite the threat from the COVID-19 now under control, no discussions had taken place to lift the night curfew and this was likely to remain till such time cases came down to a minimal number. The curfew was in place to avoid public gatherings at night.
Meanwhile Sri Lanka is slowly resuming to normalcy, with schools set to re-open in stages from June 29 onwards while places of worship will re-open for services from Friday, with a maximum of 50 worshippers. Botanical gardens, national parks and zoo’s will re-open from June 15 while tution classes will resume from June 29.
Cinemas will however continue to be closed until further notice.
Till last evening over 1,860 patients had been detected with the virus in Sri Lanka, out of which over 1,100 had recovered and been released.