Due to the heavy spike in COVID-19 cases in the country, 90% of the hospital beds have been occupied by COVID patients and only 10% beds are to treat other patients, the Government Medical Officers' Association (GMOA) said.

GMOA General Committee Member Dr. Prasad Colombage said after a huge effort, the hospital management had managed to control the situation at ICUs, but more than 50% of the ICU beds have already been occupied.

"The vaccination programme is underway in line with the hospital treatment for COVID virus, but there are a few issues related to the vaccination drive and it was progressing a bit slow due to lack of vaccines in the recent days, he said.

"The COVID vaccines should be given within a specific period, but people who had received their first dose were unable to get their second dose. Certain people have exceeded the timeframe in getting the second jab.

 Therefore the GMOA requested the Health Ministry to vaccinate at the correct time to minimise the spreading of virus and death toll," Dr. Colombage said. (Chaturanga Samarawickrama)