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By APD writer Rishika, Hussain, Melo M. Acuña
Health experts and officials from the Philippines, India, and Pakistan have applauded China’s rapid and effective efforts to combat the current outbreak of the novel coronavirus pneumonia or COVID-19.
Philippine health officials highly appreciated China’s prevention and control measures of the disease and expressed their hopes to learn from the Chinese experience.
Health Assistant Secretary Maria Rosario Dr. S. Vergeire on Monday said the Philippines has got data and will learn from the Chinese experts on addressing the epidemic.
At a press briefing in Manila, capital of the Philippines, Dr. Vergerie, also the head of the Public Health Services Team of the Department of Health, said the Philippine government hopes to acquire strategies from the Chinese authorities for local use.
Dr. Maria Rosario Vergeire
Over at the Presidential Palace, Cabinet Secretary Karlo Alexie Nograles said he is happy to see that the situation in China is under control.
“I hope the Chinese government would continue to control the disease and I believe they could do that,” he said.
Nograles, the highest-ranking official in attendance, also said he hopes that the Philippines would lift the travel ban on China after an assessment by the Inter-Agency Task Force on Emerging Infectious Disease (IATF-EID) in the near future.
The IATF-EID has approved a repatriation and quarantine plan for Filipino crew members aboard the M/V Diamond Princess cruise ship. A total of 59 out of the 538 overseas Filipinos from the ship have been confirmed with COVID-19, the Department of Health told the media.
Pakistani health experts voiced confidence in their brotherly country China dealing with the virus outbreak.
Dr. Raheela Aamir, a medical specialist at Shifa International Hospital in Islamabad said that the epidemic is yet to be explored but one thing is clear that his Chinese counterparts with state-of-the-art technologies are dealing with the deadly disease efficiently.
“These efforts are now showing some positivity as according to Chinese officials over 20,000 people have recovered from the virus and same goes for the death toll,” he said last Saturday.
Also, India doctors and medical practitioners spoke positively China’s measures to fight against the epidemic.
Dr. Satinder Singh Minhas
Dr. Satinder Singh Minhas, the department of General Surgery at MM Medical College & Hospital, Himachal Pradesh, on Monday praised China’s strong measures against the virus.
“As it will take time for people to build immunity against the virus, isolating the patients is a good solution to the problem at hand. China’s quarantine efforts have been commendable. The authorities have focused on the interests of the community, which is the need of the hour. The new hospitals that China built recently would help in attaining this objective. Other public buildings and non-hospital infrastructure can also be utilized by making make-shift arrangements there for temporary usage,” he said. Besides, screening of people at public places is also a good measure,” he said.
Dr. Neha Mishra
Dr. Neha Mishra, a research scholar at Skagg School of Pharmacology, Anschutz Medical Campus, University of Colorado, said China’s quarantine effort has proved effective in hindering the spread of the virus.
“COVID-19 is not a very virulent strain from what we see right now. I think China is doing a good job of working on a cure. Currently, it is more important I guess to first understand the diagnosis part so as to curb its spread. Some asymptomatic cases from which the virus was spread have also been reported, so it is imperative to quarantine the virus and then study it and China is focusing on the quarantine part quiet effectively,” she said.
Noting that China, as a nation having both the manpower and the scientific acumen to handle and overcome the situation, she said it would have developed a cure for it as well within a month or so.
Since the outbreak, the Chinese authorities have made all-out efforts to curb the spread of the disease. For example, two large temporary hospitals have been constructed within a record time to aid quarantine efforts. To help the early detection of COVID-19, people across the country are required to be screened at various public places like the malls by taking their body temperature.
(ASIA PACIFIC DAILY)
