12 August 2021 09:03 am Views - 125
By Ajith Siriwardana
The Government Nursing Officers’ Association (GNOA) yesterday threatened to resort to Trade Union action if the Government failed to declare a practical and scientific lockdown claiming that the health sector of the country was at risk of getting contracted with the Covid-19.
GNOA President Saman Rathnapriya told a news conference that more than 1,000 nurses have contracted the virus and altogether around 5,000 personnel in the health sector have been infected with the virus by now.
He said three health sector employees including a doctor have died of Covid-19 recently.
“The country has to face a serious situation if the health sector employees in the country became sick. More than 1,000 nurses have already been infected with the virus. Three deaths have been reported among the health sector including a doctor and an attendant recently. A total of 25 nurses in the Kandy National Hospital, 8 nurses in Matara Hospital, 12 in Karawanella and 11 nurses in the Anuradhapura Hospital have contracted the virus during the last few days,” he said and added that if the health sector became sick, the whole country was in danger.
Rathnapriya said a practical and scientific lockdown should be declared just as in Australia and New Zealand without keeping the country locked down for months without doing anything to prevent the spread of the disease.
He said once a lockdown was declared, the number of PCR tests should be increased to round up all the infected persons in the community.
“At least 100,000 PCR tests should be conducted per day. We will volunteer to conduct PCR tests. There are 38,000 nurses in the country,” he said.
He said Health TUs were ready to resort to a trade union action and force the Government to go for a lockdown and urged the Government to take steps to prevent any such action.