Amid a growing demand for personal protective equipment (PPE) from healthcare professionals, Health Minister Zahid Maleque has said Bangladesh does not require a huge number of PPEs right now.
"We do not need a large amount of PPEs right now, but we have kept several lakh PPEs in our stock," he said while responding to journalists' queries at a press conference at the secretariat on Monday.
The minister came up with the remark at a time when healthcare professionals, including doctors, nurses, and interns, claimed that they have been putting their own lives at risk while trying to identify and treat those infected with coronavirus, as necessary equipment to ensure their own safety from the deadly coronavirus have not yet been provided.
The minister, however, said Bangladesh is ready to tackle the situation.
"We are ready. No one ever prepares themselves with PPEs beforehand...We wanted to collect such protective equipment before the spread of coronavirus infection in Bangladesh, but there were no PPEs available in the market," he said, adding that China was not also providing the equipment to anyone then.
Citing the arrival of machines, he said the fully fledged laboratory facilities will be opened within 10 to 12 days once the buildings are ready with a level two security measure.
About 18,000 people are now in self quarantine because of effective management by the government, Zahid said.
"We do have 100,000 kits to detect coronavirus. So, it will not be wise to cause panic among the people by saying there is a lack of such kit or equipment."
If proper quarantine can be ensured in Bangladesh, there will be nothing to worry about, he said.
The minister, however, expressed dissatisfaction with the negligence of returnees (from abroad) who are moving freely in their areas, violating home quarantine rules.
Regarding flight suspensions, he said all the flights except in one or two routes have been suspended.
"I hope those will be suspended soon."
Bangladesh has so far recorded three deaths and 33 infections from Covid-19, a pandemic announced by the World Health Organization (WHO).
The fast spreading coronavirus has claimed more than 14,700 lives and infected over 341,000 people across the world, according to Worldometer.
