Sindh demands Covid-19 vaccination to be made mandatory for those coming from abroad

KARACHI: The Sindh government has demanded that the federal immigration authorities should declare coronavirus vaccination compulsory for people coming to the Pakistan airports from abroad.

The demand to this effect was made by Sindh Law and Environment Adviser Barrister Murtaza Wahab, who also acts as the spokesman for the Sindh government, while addressing a press conference here at the Sindh Assembly building on Tuesday.

He said mandatory vaccination and proper surveillance of the health condition of the passengers coming to the Pakistani airports from abroad were some of the measures required to be taken by the government to overcome the highly alarming spread of coronavirus infections in the country.

He said the PCR tests of the people coming from abroad to the Pakistani airports should be conducted for proper monitoring of their health. Wahab said the federal authorities earlier had taken an unwise decision to reopen borders and airports to allow the arrival of visitors from abroad when the rest of the world had imposed restrictions and hadn’t been allowing travelers from abroad.

He said tourist resorts in the Northern Areas were fully open without observance of due safety precautions by the visitors in a situation when coronavirus cases were also on the rise in the north of the country.

He criticised the federal authorities that had been saying one thing and implementing entirely another thing with regard to implementation of the lockdown restrictions in the country as this insincerity on the part of the rulers had been damaging the health care situation of the country.

He said the people who were still holding wedding functions in the city despite the ban imposed by the government were not just doing injustice with themselves but also with their children and guests who were being invited to such ceremonies.

The Sindh government’s spokesman informed media persons that there had been just 511 coronavirus patients in the province on June 26 this year that had now increased to 2,153 patients on July 26.

He said the coronavirus wards of the government-run hospitals had been filled up to 75 per cent while that of the private hospital were almost filled. “We never feel pleasure by imposing the lockdown. We want that an India-like situation doesn’t emerge in our country as for this we need to duly observe the standard operating procedures,” he said.

Wahab disclosed that up to 87 per cent of coronavirus patients who had been hospitalised in the province were those who didn’t receive the coronavirus vaccination. He said the meeting of the provincial coronavirus Task Force would again be convened on coming Friday as strict decisions would be taken by it if the current dreary situation of coronavirus infections persisted any further in the province.