Editorial Desk :The problem in Bangladesh — for dealing with the most contagious coronavirus — is lack of awareness and lack of preparedness. Any health expert should be worried to the reality of our unpreparedness.
Blaming the Health Ministry or the government is not the answer. The government has been engaged with the celebration of hundredth anniversary of the father of the nation who is no more with us.
But the pandemic we are facing is international. So we know how important it is to seek international assistance and cooperation. In spite of the limitations we cannot ignore that our valuable lives are vulnerable and must be saved, especially when the whole world is worried by the speed with which the virus is spreading and most anxious to contain the tragic human situation causing by the deadly but unknown virus.
Already we have one coronavirus affected person died. According to official claim, we have till today 14 persons have found to be suffering from coronavirus. Our quarantine system is not working.
In villages the self-quarantine is creating difficulties for the entire family members. We have every reason to feel concerned about people living in remote villages for our failure to do enough.
We are sure we have many competent men and women willing to be helpful to the people. We are lack of leadership to mobilise help within and get help from outside and our fear is that — for lack of preparedness a huge number of people will be infected and face death in Bangladesh.
So for their helpless condition, people are crying out for expert help and provide the right resources from international community. China has in particular a lot of practical experience and also resources to help other countries. Already they have gone to Italy in a big way to contribute to the efforts of Italian government and other organisations.
China has direct involvement in the development projects in Bangladesh and a large number of Chinese are working in these projects. We rightly expect positive cooperation from China. In fact we are surprised that no team of Chinese experts is already in Bangladesh.
The measures implemented by the Italian government to stop the spread of the coronavirus are admirable in line with the international standards. Despite this, the Chinese cooperation is appreciated in Italy. The Chinese doctors and experts are visiting health centres and doing what they can do.
So far, China has sent nine experts and 30 tons of material to Italy, where 17,660 people have already been infected and 1,266 have died. Besides, 99 patients with COVID-19 remain in the Spallanzani Hospital, a figure that remains unchanged since Friday, and of those, 17 have required respiratory support, with a stable clinical condition.
While China’s efforts in Italy are commendable, we expect for special relationship with China that the country would understand our situation better and a positive response for help and cooperation should have become visible to our people.
Definitely there have been many lapses in the way we have treated our citizens who have come here from infected countries. So, we need to ensure that our medical facilities — not the best in the world to begin with — are at least ready enough as the coronavirus disease spreading in Bangladesh.
As it is, we have no idea of the extent of the disease affected us as we simply don’t have the resources to test on a large scale. There is awful shortage of ventilators for respiratory complications bound to suffer such patients.
We are certainly relying on the advice of the World Health Organisation. But the lesson which China has in the meantime learned will be of immense help to our people.
