Bangladesh has been tackling the Covid-19 pandemic effectively by bringing over 75% of the total population under vaccination despite having the lowest testing rate among the 50 most-affected countries.
As per the latest data, a total of 254,831,114 doses of vaccines including booster doses were administered as the countrywide vaccination campaign was launched on February 7, last year.
In comparison to Bangladesh, neighboring countries like India and Pakistan have vaccinated 72% and 59% of its population respectively.
The world crossed 500 million infections last week amid a BA.2 Omicron subvariant surge in many countries in Europe and Asia. Even the sudden rise in Covid-19 cases in China is suspected to be caused by this sublineage, dubbed “stealth Omicron”.
However, Bangladesh is seeing a lower number of daily infections and deaths for the past month as the country reported zero deaths for 25 days out of the last 30.
On Saturday, the health authorities reported zero deaths with 51 new cases logged in the 24-hour period.
On the other hand, Bangladesh has the lowest Covid-19 testing rate among the 50 countries most affected by the coronavirus, and experts think it may become a big cause for concern even though the pandemic situation seems to have eased off in the country.
The country reported 1.28% Covid-19 positive cases as 3,994 samples were tested in the past 24 hours. Such a testing figure is comparatively lower than in neighboring countries.
Health experts in Bangladesh said the country had been seeing infection rates below 1% for the last few days, terming the phenomenon unexpected, and warned that there might be another surge in the future.
A threat is still on the cards as the low infection rates could not be attributed to the actions taken by the health authorities, remarked prof Prof Nazrul Islam, a member of the National Technical Advisory Committee on Covid-19.
The eminent virologist said Bangladesh had conducted fewer tests comparatively, could not develop healthcare centres properly, and had so far been unable to bridge the gap between government institutions.
Vaccinating a large number of people was the country’s only success in the pandemic, he said. But it was far from enough, he added, as “Ireland has vaccinated over 93% of its population, but has still seen a recent rise in Covid-19 cases”.
He continued: “When you cannot be sure of the reason behind the current Covid-19 down surge [in Bangladesh], how can you expect that there will be no more sudden increases? It is better to find out the reason and stay prepared for another possible wave.”
Concern over low testing rate
According to Worldometers, 503,884,145 Covid-19 cases have been recorded globally as of Saturday afternoon.
Of them, Bangladesh has logged 1,952,224, the second-highest caseload in South Asia after India (43,040,947) and 42nd worldwide.
Among the 50 countries most affected by the coronavirus, Bangladesh has the lowest rate of testing—it is the only country to do fewer than 100,000 tests per one million population.
The number stands at 83,027 per million as of Saturday.
Public health experts have since the start of the outbreak maintained that the lack of accurate data would hamper the pandemic management.
Echoing that line of thought, Prof Nazrul said the current data did not paint the real picture.
Coordination between institutions
Prof Nazrul opined that the government had squandered opportunities to ensure coordination among all concerned institutions and ensure public health.
He said the health authorities could only provide healthcare services after one fell sick, but other administrative bodies and agencies, like city corporations, Wasa, and the Department of Environment, had to ensure water, sanitation, hygiene, etc for citizens.
“Covid-19 has shown how important healthcare is and how everything is interconnected. We also could not ensure proper development of state-owned healthcare facilities,” he said, urging immediate measures to improve the medical care system.
