Pakistan will begin lifting its coronavirus lockdown tomorrow, Prime Minister Imran Khan has said, hours after the country announced its highest daily increase in new cases.
Pakistan, where a shutdown has been in place since late March, has recorded 24,073 cases of Covid-19, with 564 deaths.
The Covid-19 respiratory disease is caused by the coronavirus.
The authorities said yesterday that there had been 1,523 new cases and 38 deaths in the preceding 24 hours.
“We’re deciding that we are ending this lockdown now,” Prime Minister Khan said in a televised address yesterday. “We know that we’re doing it at a time when our curve is going up ... but it is not edging up as we were expecting.”
He was speaking after a meeting of National Co-ordination Committee (NCC), the apex coronavirus decision-making body comprising top civil and military leaders, including the provincial chief executives.
Impoverished Pakistanis cannot survive under lockdown any longer, the prime minister said.
“Since we started this lockdown, we had this fear that these people who are daily wagers, who feed their kids on daily earnings, what will happen to them?” Khan asked.
He said that the shutdown would be lifted in phases and warned people that the disease could get out of control if they do not take precautions.
“We need to discipline ourselves,” Khan said. “We can’t send the police to make raids. In an independent society this doesn’t happen.”
The government’s handling of the virus has been strongly criticised by scientists and doctors who fear the outbreak will gather pace among a population of more than 200mn and overwhelm the country’s struggling health system.
“It will definitely lead to an increase in the number of cases, the number of critical cases,” the secretary of Pakistan’s Young Doctors’ Association (YDA), Salman Kazmi, told Reuters. “We are concerned about pressure that will come on the hospitals.”
Planning Minister Asad Umar said that initially small markets and shops would be allowed to open until 5pm, although big malls and other spaces which attract large crowds would remain closed for now.
A decision to reopen intercity transport and railways will be taken later, while schools will stay closed until July 15, Umar said.
Prime Minister Khan said: “I was in favour of allowing public transport but the provinces did not agree to it. So, it has been decided that the provinces will make their own standard operating procedures (SOPs) and share with the Centre.”
He said that the National Command and Operations Centre (NCOC) headed by Planning Minister Umar meets daily and analyses the current situation, taking input from the provinces and consulting with doctors and experts before making the decision.
Khan warned that the restrictions could be restored if the outbreak worsens, something his critics expect to happen due to what they describe as a confused policy response to the crisis.
The prime minister allowed communal prayers for the month of Ramadan, but a survey by an NGO, Pattan, found that worshippers were breaching measures on social distancing, masks and disinfection.
Last month, authorities buckled under pressure from religious groups ahead of Ramadan and allowed mosques to hold daily prayers and evening congregations after clerics promised to instruct religious leaders to clean their facilities regularly.
Thousands of shoppers have also thronged popular markets, including many without wearing protective gear, to buy food for the evening Iftar meal that celebrates the end of each day’s fasting.
Fears for the economy are said to be the main reason for relaxing the lockdown.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank have forecast a bleak economic outlook for Pakistan as it heads toward a major recession.
The government is also facing a new challenge as thousands of overseas Pakistanis who tested positive after returning home.
This has raised concerns of a further spread of the virus.
On Monday, 105 people out of 209 who were flown to Islamabad from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) were tested positive.
from Gulf Times https://ift.tt/3bgqAxo
Comments
Post a Comment