BY SURESH PERERA

The Peliyagoda fish market coronavirus cluster believed to have been triggered by the fresh eruption of the contagion at Minuwangoda appears to be quite big in dimension and widespread in its reach, a senior medical official said.

“The fish market outbreak seems rather substantial with a potent level of transmission”, says Dr. Jayaruwan Bandara, Deputy Director of the Medical Research Institute (MRI).

“It is imperative that we trace everybody who came into contact with those infected to prevent the further spread of the virus”, he stressed.

Initially, 49 persons, mainly fish vendors, tested positive for corona, which led to the sealing of the complex on Wednesday. PCR tests were conducted on all vendors, customers and others within the premises and they were later transported in buses by the army to a quarantine centre at Diyatalawa.

By Friday, the number infected from the Peliyagoda fish market cluster climbed by another 182, while the total number of positive cases (since the Minuwangoda garment factory outbreak) has exceeded 2,850.

According to available statistics, Covid-19 cases have been reported from across many districts including Gampaha, Kurunegala, Puttalam, Galle, Hambantota, Kegalle, Kandy, Vavuniya, Anuradhapura, Polonnaruwa, Jaffna, Mannar, Badulla, Kalutara and Moneragala.

Meanwhile, Sri Lanka reported its 14th Covid-19 related death on Thursday. The patient, a 50-year-old woman from Kuliyapitiya, was under treatment at the Infectious Diseases Hospital (IDH) at the time of her death.

Asked whether the quarantine curfew imposed in some areas of Colombo North was meant to facilitate contact tracing, Dr. Bandara, who doubles up as the Health Ministry’s official spokesman, said the objective was also to curtail the movement of people.

“As most people tend to travel from one area to another within their locality for various reasons, we want to restrict their movements to arrest the transmission of the virus”, he noted.

Army Commander, Lt. Gen. Shavendra has asked people, who had visited the Peliyagoda fish market over the past few days, to report to the closest PHI office to undergo PCR tests.

Visitors to the fish market queued outside the Mahara PHI’s office at Kadawatha for PCR screening yesterday.

PCR testing is imperative as most of those who had tested positive for the deadly virus were fish vendors and the possibility of contracting the virus through contact with them remains high, public health officials cautioned.

Where the emergence of the coronavirus at the Peliyagoda fish market was concerned, health officials suspect that the primary carrier was a vendor residing at Dompe.

He is believed to have passed on the infection to the others working within the complex, though it has still not been established how he picked up the virus.

Suspicions also linger about the infection being linked to the Minuwangoda cluster, the officials said.

On Thursday, police announced the imposition of a quarantine curfew in Kotahena as well, in addition to Mattakkuliya, Modara, Bloemendhal, Grandpass and Wellampitiya, where restrictions were placed the previous day.

The curfew in these areas will continue until 5.00 am on Monday (26).

With new infections on the decline, Sri Lanka was gradually recovering from the devastating fallout of the killer virus when the eruption of the garment factory cluster hit hard by triggering a fresh wave with more almost 3,000 new cases reported so far.

The Army Commander is on record saying the Minuwangoda cluster appears to be of foreign origin, but there has to be further verification to firmly establish the source.