‘Random testing finds only about 25 in Colombo city daily; vigorous vaccination also on’

Around 85-110 positive cases are detected per day, the vast majority being first-line contacts, while random testing detects around 20-25 cases, said Colombo Municipal Council’s Chief Medical Officer, Dr. Ruwan Wijayamuni on Friday.

He assured that unlike in the second wave, Colombo city is not seeing “a rampant wildfire” sort of spread yet and attributed it partly to the very vigorous vaccination campaign.

Vaccination campaign

So far, about 190,000 people in Colombo city, which has about 600,000 people, have been vaccinated with either the AstraZeneca or Sinopharm vaccines. Therefore, 1/3rd of the city’s population has got the jab, said Dr. Wijayamuni.

He said that around 98,823 people are awaiting the second dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine. When these stocks will arrive, is the million dollar question. The government is trying very hard to get stocks. Vaccines are available in the international black market, but their quality is questionable. This is why the government is seeking an assurance from the manufacturer about the maintenance of the cold- chain and the authenticity of the product.

With America hoping to donate vaccines, he was hopeful that Sri Lanka could get some stocks to give the second jab.

Dr. Wijayamuni and his team are planning to vaccinate everyone who is over 18 years of age by the end of August, if they get adequate stocks. These could be different types of vaccines.

“Currently we are vaccinating those over 30 years of age, but we should ideally be vaccinating those over 18 because they are active and could take the disease home. Those 60 and above are at high-risk of dying but they are basically at home, so we have to focus on the economically and physically-active age-groups,” he said.