Tests to start in divisional HQs
The government has recently imported seven PCR machines to scale up the testing facilities of Covid-19 in the divisional level.
It has already instructed all district-level hospitals to inform the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) about their current number of medical technologists as new manpower would be recruited in this position in every district.
The medical technologists collect samples from suspected patients and analyse them in the laboratory of a hospital or diagnostic centre.
"The PCRs will be set up at the divisional medical colleges. The medical technologists of those hospitals will soon be given training," Abul Kalam Azad, Director General of DGHS, told The Daily Star.
He also said the government would appoint new medical technologists at the district hospitals within a week.
Currently, the Institute of Epidemiology, Disease Control and Research (IEDCR) is the country's lone facility for testing Covid-19.
Experts, however, said that the government should act more aggressively to bring more people within the purview of testing facilities, which would help better understand the situation.
They said more tests should be conducted to find out the real scenario.
Mahmudur Rahman, former director of the IEDCR, also said the surveillance system has to be beefed upto better understand the situation.
"We heard that on several occasions the IECDR refused to collect samples even after the hospital authorities had approached them," he said, adding that the IECDR must collect samples in such cases.
Mahmudur said currently the government is examining the expatriates and the people who came into the contact of those people.
"But according to WHO protocol, those who are facing respiratory problems should also be tested," he added.
There have been several allegations that the hospitals are not treating the patients with respiratory problems suspecting coronavirus infection.
Health officials said they were fearing because of the lack of protective gears.
"If I don't get my protective gear, why should I risk my life? I am a doctor and at the same time a human being. I have every right to get proper safety gears before giving treatment," said a physician at Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical University, wishing not to be named.
He said 10 doctors were sent to quarantine at a time when only 24 patients have been tested positive.
Government officials also acknowledged the problem saying the situation would be improved soon.
"The situation calls for a lot of motivation and we are motivating the physicians," Azad said.
Be-Nazir Ahmed, former director (disease control) of the DGHS, said "home management" is the most effective way to contain the outbreak. "If every household protects their house from the spread of coronavirus, the situation will improve."
Muzaherul Huq, former regional adviser of WHO's South East Asia region, shared a different version saying the government should encourage people to go for a voluntary self-quarantine.
"Indeed, everyone will not follow it but if we can impose a strict monitoring system, it will work.
"A huge number of expatriates have already arrived in Bangladesh and the union parishad members are supposed to be aware of the foreign returnees in the areas of their jurisdiction," he said.
He suggested that the government should hold the union parishad members accountable and responsible for failing to ensure the quarantine of the returnees."
Huq believes that the virus has already transmitted to the community level and recommended that makeshift hospitals or quarantine zones should be set up at the stadiums in every district to treat the coronavirus patients.
Meanwhile, three more people in the country were tested positive for coronavirus, raising the cases of total infected to 27, said Prof Meerjady Sabrina Flora, director of the IEDCR.
Of the 27 cases, five were released after treatment, two died and 20 others are currently undergoing treatment at different hospitals.
The first coronavirus cases were confirmed in the country on March 8 and the first death on March 18. The second person died from coronavirus on Saturday.