WHO Asks Pakistan To Implement ‘Intermittent Lockdown’, Says It Has Failed To Meet Any Of The Conditions For Lifting It

As Pakistan has registered its highest single-day spike of Covid-19 cases with over 5,000 infections reported in the last 24 hours, World Health Organisation (WHO) has urged the government to follow an “intermittent lockdown” policy to contain the spread of the pandemic, Dawn reported.

Expressing concern over the what it described as the hasty lifting of restrictions, the WHO said that Pakistan did not meet any of the prerequisites for opening of the lockdown.

In a letter dated 7 June, Dr Palitha Mahipala, WHO Country Head for Pakistan, pointed out that coronavirus has spread to almost all districts in the country, with major cities making up a majority of national cases.

The WHO official stated that Pakistan has failed to meet any of the conditions for lifting lockdown including controlling the transmission of the disease, building ability in the health system to "detect, test, isolate and treat every case and trace every contact", implementation of preventive measures in Schools, workplaces and other essential places.

"The positivity rate is high, the surveillance system is weak, there is limited capacity to provide for critical patients and the population is not ready to adapt to change in behaviour," the letter added.

The WHO official also pointed out that Pakistan's reproductive number (R), which is an estimate for the number of individuals infected by each carrier, is also greater than 1.

“The positivity rate is high at 24 per cent (above the required level of 5 per cent), the surveillance system (identify, test, isolate, care for the ill including identification and follow up of contacts and quarantining) is weak.” the letter noted.

“As of today, Pakistan does not meet any of the pre-requisite conditions for opening the lockdown,” the WHO observed, while warning the government the virus had spread to every nook and corner of Pakistan.

“After partial relaxation of measures on 1 May 2020, then followed by complete relaxation on 22 May, the rate of spread of Covid-19 increased in Pakistan,” the letter observed.

The WHO advised the government to enhance daily testing capacity to 50,000 to assess the actual prevalence of coronavirus across the country. It urged the government to follow an “intermittent lockdown” policy to stem the spike in the disease.