Chairman Task Force for Science and Technology, Dr. Ata ur Rehman has appealed the government of Sindh to take immediate and concrete steps to control increasing coronavirus cases reported in South and East of Karachi.
Dr. Ata urged for concrete steps. He asked for increasing testing capacity besides implementing steps to identify patients and ensure the safety and security of the people.
He said practicing social distancing and other necessary standard operating procedures would help combat the spreading of the virus in the country.
He said identifying patients would also help count an exact number of virus-affected people and to restrict the spread of the pandemic.
The existing capacity of testing people was not sufficient, he remarked adding, the government would have to accelerate the process of testing from 20,000 per day to 1,00,000 per day and may be more.
About the treatment of coronavirus pandemic, he said our pathological experts were engaged in a project for clinical testing of the affected patients with this dangerous virus.
Elaborating the procedure adopted by the health experts in Karachi and Lahore, he said a combination of two drugs namely hydroxychloroquine, an anti-malarial drug with erythromycin, is used for treating infection would yield results.
To a question about vaccination, Dr. Ata ur Rehman said, it would take nearly 10 to 12 months for checking the authenticity of the vaccination.
He added that after the manufacturing period of the vaccination, they need to undergo clinical testing of COVID-19, patients. He hoped that the combination of drugs would be helpful for treating COVID-19, virus.
He said thanks to Almighty Allah, the fatality rate in Pakistan was not as high as reported in European countries.
The intensity of the virus in this region was very low, he said. Commenting on lockdown, he said the incumbent government was contemplating to order ‘smart lockdown’ because a complete shutter down in this poor country would not be feasible.