Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has expressed sadness at the news of UK Prime Minister Boris Johnsontesting positive for COVID-19.
“While we’re all fighting our own battles and challenges against the spread and loss of lives from the coronavirus pandemic, I have been closely following all your timely and dynamic leadership initiatives including extreme lockdown, supporting laws and financial stimulus to protect the people of the United Kingdom from the devastation and death from the coronavirus,” she said in a letter that sent to him.
She also said Bangladesh will always be ready to work with UK in the spirit of existing cooperations in mutual efforts to overcome this challenge and with determination to succeed.
PM’s Assistant Press Secretary ABM Sarwer-E-Alom Sarker said that in the letter, the prime minister wished Johnson swift recovery.
Sheikh Hasina said Bangladesh acted very seriously from the very outset of this crisis understanding the grave concern over the global outbreak of this virus.
“We started screening the suspects at the airport along with the arrangement of dedicated quarantine zones for the people arriving from the affected countries since January. A high-powered national committee including the task forces of different compositions was formed to tackle the different dimensions of the spread of COVID-19 and its challenges,” she wrote.
She said the government prepared designated hospitals, and equipped health professionals with necessary facilities. It shut down all educational institutions and locked down infection-prone areas to prevent community transmission and advised people to stay home.
“We suspended all public gatherings relating to the celebration of the long-cherished birth centenary of our Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and cancelled all the state and private get-togethers. We closed down all government and private offices and activities except the emergency services to curb the spread of the virus for 10 days since the 25th of this month,” she wrote.
She said the government is unceasingly conducting mass awareness to protect the people from coronavirus.
Due to these preemptive measures, Bangladesh has so far 48 confirmed cases with fiveunfortunate deaths, along with 11 complete recoveries, she added.
