Revision of protocol causes surge in recovery

Bangladesh continued to record a dramatic rise in the number of daily recovery of COVID-9 patients for the second consecutive day with 147 new patients recorded to have recovered in the 24 hours until 8:00am Monday.

With the latest figure the total recovery rose to 1,209, which was only 177 just on Saturday.

The Health Services Directorate raised its tally of recovered patients by 886 in the gap of 24 hours until 8:00am Sunday saying that it developed a new criterion for determining recovery of the COVID-19 patients.

The criterion was, however, not explained to the public.

‘I don’t know anything about the new criterion for declaring patients’ recovery. I read what I am asked to read,’ Health Services additional director general Nasima Sultana, who updates the people on COVID-19 situation in online briefing every day, told New Age.

Nasima, the second-in-command in the Directorate General of Health Services, hung up on this reporter when her advice was sought about who could explain to the press the new recovery criterion.

The Health Services Director General did not answer phone calls either.

The sudden rise in the number of recoveries coincided with the growing criticism of Bangladesh’s slow recovery rate compared to other Asian countries and to the global trend.

While globally the COVID-19 recoveries remained far greater than deaths caused by the disease, in Bangladesh the situation was exactly the opposite.

Until Saturday, roughly 2 per cent COVID-19 patients recovered in Bangladesh with almost a similar death rate from the disease.

In fact, the death rate remained greater than the recovery rate ever since the disease emerged in Bangladesh early March until Saturday.

The recovery percentages in countries such as India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Myanmar and Nepal ranged from 21.33 per cent to 27.74 per cent until Monday.

The death rates in India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Myanmar and Nepal were 3.26 per cent, 2.28 per cent, 0.97 per cent, 3.87 per cent and 0 per cent respectively.

Real-time statistics of the reference website, Worldometer, also showed that the global recovery rate was 32 per cent until Monday against the death rate of 6.93 per cent.

With the sudden rise in the recovery rate of COVID-19 patients in Bangladesh, which jumped from 2 per cent to more than 12 per cent in just two days, the country finally appeared to be fitting in the global pattern.

The steep rise in recovery also coincided with the government’s decision to relax shutdown by opening garment factories and allowing other economic activities.

Public health expert Rashid-e-Mahbub said that the government had recently decided to release a COVID-19 patient from hospital as soon as the disease symptoms subsided in him or her.

‘The new government protocol identifies asymptomatic patients as not sick as they have no symptoms but they are not coronavirus-free,’ said Rashid.

Under the newly developed protocol the government would send such asymptomatic coronavirus patients back home with the instruction to self-isolate until he or she was tested negative for coronavirus twice in a row, he said.

‘The new protocol will increase the risk of the coronavirus infection further spreading. This is a bad news for public health,’ said Rashid.

Health Services Director (Hospital) Aminul Islam refused to comment on the new recovery protocol.

The World Health Organisation standards consider a COVID-19 patient free of the disease after he or she has tested negative for the new coronavirus twice in a row.

In the last two months, people did not get any news of recovery from the health directorate but only about new infections.

The Directorate General of Health Services never discussed its ways of treating COVID-19 patients to the media despite repeated requests.

News Courtesy: www.newagebd.net