Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has called for “global coordination” as well as “putting more policy and financial focus” to effectively fight any future world catastrophe like the present coronavirus pandemic.
“I will urge everyone to consider this crisis as a wakeup call for global coordination to effectively deal with any future world catastrophe and for putting more policy and financial focus on health issues like capacity building and achievement of health security for all,” she said in a letter to World Health Organization (WHO) Director General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus on Saturday.
PM’s Press Secretary Ihsanul Karim said in the letter, the Prime Minister mentioned that Bangladesh, from time immemorial, believes in working together with all countries – regionally and globally as practiced by Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman.
“We’re a strong believer in multilateralism. Since infectious disease and pandemics do not respect any border, we are further engaged regionally under the SAARC mechanism and globally through UN, and WHO to prevent the spread of the COVID-19 and to address this unprecedented crisis in the recent history,” she said.
The premier said Bangladesh is grateful to all the countries and organizations, which have extended their support to its health system. “We hope that WHO and international community will stand beside
us to overcome this grave calamity,” she said. Sheikh Hasina praised the WHO director general for his relentless efforts and leadership during this crisis moments. “I’m confident that we’ll soon be able to leave behind this dark episode, unitedly,” she said.
The Prime Minister also thanked Dr Ghebreyesus for his comprehensive letter of March 23, 2020 which captured all the risks and the possible counter actions to effectively combat the global menace of COVID-19.
“Let me take this opportunity to thank the WHO for their immediate pro-active actions and express our firm confidence in the role and actions taken by WHO in this regard,” she said.
Sheikh Hasina also appreciated the WHO director general for his continuous personal supervision and leadership to face this crisis together all over the world.
“Like you, we also firmly believe that we can prevent the spread of COVID-19 by limiting and then breaking the chains of transmission,” she added.
Spelling out her government’s measures to curb the lethal virus, the premier said all these efforts are now producing fruitful outcomes in terms of testing, isolation and quarantine verification.
Sheikh Hasina said, the government had started working on this issue soon after its outbreak in China and developed a ‘National Preparedness and Response Plan for COVID-19, Bangladesh’ as the national contingency plan.
“It’s being constantly updated to address the evolving situations according to WHO guidelines under one ‘National Committee’ and another ‘Technical Committee’,” she said.
The premier added: “Like Sustainable Development Goal (SDG), here we also have adopted ‘whole of the Government’ approach based on essential elements for example (i) Surveillance and laboratory support, (ii) Contact tracing and point of entry screening, (iii) Case management and infection prevention control, (iv) Risk communication and community engagement, (v) Logistics and procurement, for effective coordination.”
Sheikh Hasina said, the government has taken steps to activate emergency protocols and harmonise national and international response management.
“In addition to national committees, we’ve formed committees at regional, district, sub-district and below levels involving the public representatives, health professionals, administration and others to provide continuous guidance to concerned people,” she said.
The premier said, the government has taken stringent measures for ensuring social distancing – including closing of all educational institutions, shutting down all government and private offices, markets (other than the very essential ones) for 41 days and prohibited all sorts of gatherings even during this holy month of Ramadan.
