A fresh, new-style lockdown is very likely to be enforced in capital Dhaka from tomorrow ( Monday), and in some other parts of the country very soon, following a serious deterioration of the Covid-19 pandemic situation in the country.
However, the move might be delayed a couple of days to complete last minute preparations for effectively enforcing the areawise complete lockdown.
If preparations are completed properly, area-wise lockdown in other parts of the country will also begin on Thursday.
The Expert Committee on tackling COVID-19 has already given its opinions to enforce the new style lockdown at the hot spots or clusters in the capital where the infections are continuously rising towards very dangerous levels.
Health Ministry sources said they are giving capital Dhaka the topmost priority in the first stage of area based lockdown to contain COVID-19.
Officials of the Directorate General of Health Services have already finalized the lists of the hot spots in the capital. Now these areas will be under complete lockdown tomorrow or the day after tomorrow, sources said. After enforcing this new style of lockdown in the capital city, Gazipur and Narayanganj will also be under such extreme level restrictions.
This time, the government will be very strict in areas which will be under the areawise lockdown. None will be allowed to come out of their houses until the situation becomes normal.
The committee using specialized software in association with the ICT division, has been preparing a health map from towns to villages by detecting the telephone numbers of the infected patients. These preparations in the capital have almost finished.
Health ministry sources told this correspondent that the red zone will be declared after detecting the phone numbers of the COVID-19 patients in the specific areas. The red zone will be put under total restrictions. In this way, on calculations of the phone numbers of COVID-19 patients of the specific areas, the yellow zone and green zone will be also declared. If necessary, yellow zones will also be under some restrictions.
If the software shows that COVID-19 patients are increasing alarmingly in the yellow zones, officials will declare these yellow zones into red zones. Then complete restrictions will be enforced in the areas.
But if the COVID-19 patients decrease in the red zones, officials will first change the status to yellow zone. If the numbers of infection become very low, the yellow zones will be finally changed into green zones.
There will be no restrictions in the green zones, officials confirmed. But if infections start increasing there, the green zones will be turned into yellow zones at first. If necessary, these areas will be declared as red zones.
Additional Secretary of Health Ministry, Habibur Rahman Khan also admitted the government’s plan to enforce area based lockdown on a pilot basis.
According to him, the government is going to start enforcing area wise lockdown very soon.
He said that considering hot spots or clusters, neighbourhoods, communities and wards will be locked down in a bid to stop further escalation of COVID-19.
Bangladesh first detected a COVID-19 patient on March 8. Government declared a general holiday from March 26 to May 31 in several phases to contain COVID-19 infections. But most of the people ignored the government’s instructions and health guidelines.
RMG owners forcibly brought workers from different areas. Amid criticism and tougher stand of the government high ups, factory owners had to send back these workers to their homes.
After some relaxation of vehicle movements , large numbers of people also went to their village homes to celebrate Eid-ul Fitr. They again returned to the capital and other towns. Thus, infections spread out in most of the areas of the country.
The country on Saturday reported 35 more fatalities from the novel coronavirus in a daily count, raising the toll from the pandemic to 846.
DGHS Additional Director General, Prof Nasima Sultana told a virtual media briefing at the DGHS in the city that the tally of infections has also surged to 63,026 after 2,635 new COVID-19 cases were detected in 24 hours.
According to a recent report of the Economist, infections are rising fast in Bangladesh, India and Pakistan.
The report claimed that the number of infections in Dhaka can be as high as 750,000.
“John Clemens of ICDDR,B (International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh), estimates that Dhaka, may already have as many as 750,000 cases, even though the official national tally is less than 60,000,” it reads.
Considering all these factors, the government this time is going very tough on tackling COVID-19.