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Jaffna insistent on preserving zero virus count despite assault on officials
Despite a violent confrontation, healthcare officials in the north, which has seen no confirmed case of coronavirus yet, are determined to keep up checks and public campaigns while closely monitoring 546 people in self-quarantine.
With 76 coronavirus (COVID19) cases recorded in other parts of the country (by Saturday morning), northern healthcare authorities have mobilised staff to carry out an aggressive grassroots awareness and prevention campaign.
Thousands of healthcare officers, including central, provincial and local government Public Health Inspectors (PHI), have been deployed.
“We have instructed our healthcare staff and PHI officials to keep tabs on those 546 persons who are in self-quarantine in their homes. After the quarantine period, they will be certified as non-infected and can re-engage with society,” Jaffna District Secretary Kanapathipillai Mahesan told The Sunday Times.
“We are taking every possible step to ensure the safety of the people and we expect them to co-operate with us,” he said, stressing the importance of people taking personal responsibility not to spread infection.
On Monday, a Medical Officer of Health (MOH) and a friend assisting him were assaulted in Jaffna while engaged in an awareness programme.
Kayts MOH Dr. P. Nandakumar and his friend, T. Sivaruban, a non-academic staffer at the University of Jaffna came under attack while questioning diners at a restaurant.
While Dr. Nandakumar was able to escape from the scene, his friend was assaulted and needed treatment in hospital for minor injuries.
The two had been asking a group of diners from overseas about their travel history when an argument broke out and an employee of the restaurant allegedly assaulted the doctor and his assistant.
Three people, including employees from the restaurant, were taken into custody and remanded till March 31 after being produced at Jaffna Magistrate Courts.
Later, police tracked down the visitors who had been in the restaurant and learned that they had arrived in the country a week previously, on March 8, and instructed the tourists to quarantine themselves for 14 days to ensure they were not carrying coronavirus.
Condemning the incident, the Regional Directorate of Jaffna Health Services, Dr. R. Ketheeswaran emphasised that healthcare employees engaged in awareness campaigns are trying to prevent a possible outbreak of the coronavirus and that this work should not be discouraged.
In Jaffna, out of 11 people admitted so far to a special hospital ward set up to handle coronavirus patients, only one remained with test results pending. To date, there have been no positive cases of coronavirus recorded in the region.
The Director of the Jaffna Teaching Hospital, Dr. T. Sathiyamoorthy, said specimen samples of suspected cases were being sent to a laboratory in Anuradhapura for testing through Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR), a technique used to test virus specimens in batches.
“We are expecting this PCR testing facility to be made available to our hospital by next week,” Dr Sathiyamoorthy said, noting that Jaffna Teaching Hospital was the major state hospital in the region with adequate medical facilities.
Among those tested for possible COVID-19 was former Tamil National Alliance (TNA) parliamentarian S. Shritharan, who travelled to Geneva early this month to attend United Nations Human Rights Council sittings. He voluntarily subjected himself for testing. The test result on Thursday was negative.
Despite government assurances of adequate stocks of essential goods, thousands of panicked people rushed to supermarkets and shops this week, disregarding government instructions to practise social distancing to reduce the possibility of infection.
In Jaffna, hours after the three-day island-wide curfew was announced on Friday morning, people flocked into vegetable markets and state-run supermarkets.
Consumers were told they could purchase only limited amounts – for example, 1kg of dhal and two tins of fish – at the controlled price introduced by the government this week.
Many private vendors refused to sell at the controlled price, claiming their stocks had been purchased at the old price and they could not afford to sell it cheaper. Consumers accused vendors of making excuses in order to profit from the situation.
On Friday, consumers flocked into Maruthanarmadam, one of the major markets in the north, for weekend grocery shopping and found that vegetable prices had skyrocketed following news of the curfew. Many lamented that there were no officials of the Consumer Affairs Authority or the Valikaamam Pradeshiya Sabha present to take action against profiteering vendors.