They said many COVID-19 patients who remain undetected due to the poor testing capacity in the country will work as ‘super spreaders’ of the virus with their free movement, frustrating the government’s fight against the deadly virus.
Even, Health Minister Zahid Maleque said it can be presumed that the infection rate will go up to some extent with the reopening of garment factories, shops and markets. “We’ll have to keep it under control as much as possible.”
On Monday, the government decided to allow the reopening of shopping malls and other businesses from May 10 on a limited scale considering the month of Ramadan and the upcoming Eid-ul-Fitr, the biggest festival of Muslims.
Though the government has imposed some conditions –maintaining social distance, cleaning hands with sanitiser while entering malls and shops, following the guideline of Health and Family Welfare Ministry and regularly, disinfecting incoming transports to the markets–health experts think it is unlikely to be implemented unless law enforces, including army, keep a sharp eye on the markets.
They suggested people, especially those have comorbidities, choosing online for their eid shopping instead of visiting the shops and shopping malls amid the risk of the infection of the virus.
There is also a light of hope that many people have taken to Facebook opposing the business reopening move and promising that they will not go to shopping malls risking their lives while the authorities of two largest shipping malls, Bashundhara City and Jamuna Future Park, decided not to reopen their markets.
Dr Be-Nazir Ahmed, former director (disease control) of the DGHS said it is a wrong decision to reopen businesses when the coronavirus cases are sharply rising. “We’re going to reopen shopping malls at a time when community transmission is going on in a full swing and most of the infected people remained undetected for lack of adequate testing capacity. We’re doing it when people will indulge in a shopping spree before eid. So, the consequences will be dire.”
Even though the shutdown could not be enforced properly, he said it helped immensely slow down the corona infection. “As we reopened RMG factories and restaurants for selling iftar, the shutdown has become slack and people have started roaming here and there. If we reopen the shopping malls, we won’t have any control over public movement and thus we’ll lose control on the coronavirus situation.”
As a large number of corona-infected people are asymptomatic, he said they will freely move everywhere and transmit the virus like wildfire.
The health expert feared that if the infected people crowd the markets and work as salesmen or saleswomen at the shops they will become ‘super spreaders’ of the virus transmission as people who will come close to them or touch the products only to get infected.
He suggested ramping up the testing capacity, forcing the shops owners and market authorities to ensure all the safety measures to keep the virus transmission limited. ♦
