Ambassador of Japan to Pakistan Matsuda Kuninori commended Pakistan’s tremendous efforts to tackle the coronavirus, which has so far left 26 people dead and over 2000 infected in Pakistan. Japanese ambassador said this while talking to Special Assistant to Prime Minister on Health Dr Zafar Mirza here in Islamabad on Thursday. During the meeting, both leaders discussed the situation arising out of COVID-19.
Dr. Mirza said that Japan provided Pakistan $2.16 million as assistance in the fight against the novel coronavirus. “This support will boost Pakistan’s capacity to quickly track the coronavirus affected persons and treat them accordingly”.
Moreover, Dr Zafar Mirza on the occasion said that Pakistan is taking all necessary measures to contain the spread of coronavirus in the country. “PM Imran Khan is closely monitoring the coronavirus situation”.
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The government of Japan has decided to provide grant of $1,620,000 through The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and $540,000 through International Organisation for Migration (IOM) to the Government of Pakistan to equip Pakistani people to fight against the Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19) Infection.
Federal Minister for Economic Affairs Hammad Azhar on Wednesday thanked the government of Japan for giving Pakistan a generous grant to help the fight against coronavirus pandemic. The minister talking to the micro-blogging website Twitter, said that the grant valued at $2 million will be dessiminated to Pakistan via UNICEF and IOM.
We are grateful to the Japanese government for providing $ 2 million in grant assistance through UNICEF and IOM to Pakistan for dealing with Covid-19.
In addittion they have allocated Rs 2.5 Billion from their existing unspent grant funds in Pakistan towards health projects. pic.twitter.com/SwQ93rDhGP— Hammad Azhar (@Hammad_Azhar) April 1, 2020
The tweet read: “We are grateful to the Japanese government for providing $ 2 million in grant assistance through UNICEF and IOM to Pakistan for dealing with COVID-19. In addition, they have allocated Rs 2.5 Billion from their existing unspent grant funds in Pakistan towards health projects.”
WHO lauds Pakistan’s timely response
Recently, the World Health Organization (WHO) has termed Pakistan’s measures against novel coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak as “timely” and the “best national response”. Country Head of the WHO Dr Palitha Gunarathna Mahipala, while talking to media in Karachi during his visit to various hospitals and testing labs, said: “At a time when other countries were reporting cases, Pakistan was keeping the virus at bay, which is something quite praiseworthy.”
Mahipala said people should regularly wash their hands with soap and water at least for 20 seconds and use sanitisers when they can’t wash their hands. He also said that adopting coughing etiquette was also very important as it would prevent spreading the virus to others.
The WHO official was in the city to assess the provincial government’s response to the virus and to inspect isolation units set up in various hospitals.
Read More: Pakistan’s defence lies in God, antibodies and hot weather?
During his visit to Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre (JPMC), he met the Executive Director Dr Seemin Jamali and expressed satisfaction over steps taken by the health institute for providing health care to the suspected patients. He called for more testing facilities in the public sector in case the number of patients increased.
Pakistan has come up with the one of world’s best “national response programs” against COVID-19 pandemic, he said and urged the people to follow the precautionary and preventive measures to avoid contracting the virus, which is extremely contagious but not as lethal as some other members of the coronavirus family.