With Bangladesh having eased lockdown restrictions, there was always the fear that Covid-19 cases in the country might see a spike without a proper plan in place. Unfortunately, this has been proven to be the case, as Bangladesh continues to see a surge in the number of cases and deaths, and is now among the top 20 most affected countries in the world in terms of total number of confirmed cases.
The authorities, however, appear to have learned the error of their ways, and are now proposing a lockdown strategy -- mapping the country into red, yellow, and green zones -- to better control the spread of Covid-19. Diving the country into zones to better identify the areas with the most Covid-19 cases -- data which will be provided by the ICT division of the government -- will help modify the strategy of the government, with red zones seeing stricter lockdown restrictions.
While it is encouraging to see that the government is indeed taking measures and at least trying to come up with strategies to better control the spread of the virus, it is unfortunate that the response was as delayed as it was -- there was a need to have a plan in place before lockdowns were eased, to begin with.
Nevertheless, now that the plan has been proposed, there is no reason for delays anymore. The plan must go through the approval procedure and implementation as swiftly and as efficiently as possible. Already, there have been too many deaths, with many more registering on a daily basis.
The hope is that implementing this plan -- late as it is -- and with better measures, we can transform the red zones into yellow zones, and eventually green zones, thereby reducing the impact of the virus in our country.