BY SANATH NANAYAKKARE

UNP leader Ranil Wickremesinghe on Friday urged the government to extend the lockdown in keeping with the advice of health experts by one or two more weeks.

“Today we have reached a point where the damage caused by a lockdown is far less than the damage caused by not having a lockdown”, he said.

‘At the moment we are are treating people who have tested positive for the virus. But we have to reduce the rapid spread taking place at large. The current 10-day lockdown received everyone’s support, but it is not sufficient according to medical experts. Another one to two weeks’ lockdown would be required,” he said.

He also recommended seeking the assistance of the IMF to deal with the economic repercussions the country is faced with, as the country has already received $ 720 million from the IMF for COVID control.

“The entire nation would support an extension as it supported the current lockdown. I would like to recommend to the government, President, Prime Minister and the Cabinet of Ministers that we extend the lockdown in line with expert medical advice and also considering the data on coronavirus case counts and the number of deaths due to the disease.” he said.

He further said: “Mangala Samaraweea, MTV’s S. Rajamahendran, President’s Counsel D. S Wijesinghe and eminent personality Gowri Thawarasa passed away due to COVID. Six people whom I knew passed away on Monday and Tuesday. There have been 5,000 COVID related deaths since August 7. Three thousand deaths have occurred within the last 20 days. This is a high rate of deaths,” he said.

The UNP leader also said that COVID-19 case numbers were found to be inaccurate and therefore the real spread of the disease was not correctly known.