The State of Public Emergency declared by the President Adama Barrow as part of efforts to fight the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic will elapse on Friday. The outbreak however is far from over as the country has now registered a total number of twenty-three cases.
This increase in the number of cases recorded despite all efforts to stem its spread makes a case for tightening of the measures and doing more sensitisation campaigns to let people understand its dangers rather than ending of the emergency.
Granted, around the world, most countries are beginning to institute gradual measures to end the lockdown of their countries as they see the reduction of their rate of infection. Every country does its own assessment and takes the decision to open up or continue the same measures.
In The Gambia though this doesn’t seem like the time to relax the efforts or measures to fight the disease as it seems to be on the rise. It will therefore be prudent to extend the State of Public Health Emergency for some time and observe the trend of the disease.
The National Assembly will Friday sit over this and other issues relating to the country’s fight against the COVID-19 pandemic. It is envisaged that the House will extend the SoPE declared earlier by the president to ensure that a lifting of it does not cause a surge in the number of recorded cases.
It is important to note that up until now, not everyone in the country has taken this pandemic seriously and government needs to do more to ensure that there isn’t a surge in recorded cases. This virus requires a concerted and sustained effort to defeat.
