Six BGF personnel among latest virus cases in Maungdaw as town hall becomes temporary hospital

By DMG 30 Jun 2021

DMG Newsroom
30 June 2021, Maungdaw 

Another 15 people including six members of a Border Guard Force (BGF) have tested positive for Covid-19 in Maungdaw town as a makeshift medical facility to accommodate an overflow of coronavirus patients was set up at Maungdaw’s Thiri Mingalar Hall this week.  

“The six BGF are newly deployed to Maungdaw. Another one is from Kanyindan village and eight others had contact with a Covid-19 patient,” said Dr. Nu Kaythi San, superintendent of Maungdaw District People’s Hospital, where space for more Covid-19 patients has run out despite two people being discharged on June 30.  

“The two patients who were discharged from the hospital today are staff of the General Administration Department,” Dr. Nu Kaythi San said on Wednesday. 

A day earlier, she told DMG that Thiri Mingalar Hall would be converted into a “temporary hospital” to accommodate the patient overflow. 

“As the number of Covid-19 cases increases, the Thiri Mingalar Hall will be used as a temporary hospital,” she said. 

On Wednesday, the number of Covid-19 cases recorded in Maungdaw Township this month rose to 43, five of whom have been discharged from hospital. 

Maungdaw District People’s Hospital is currently providing treatment to 32 Covid-19 patients and six others are being cared for at Thiri Mingalar Hall. 

With Covid-19 cases rising in Maungdaw, a mask mandate was imposed on June 30 and those who fail to comply will face action from July 1, said Dr. Nu Kaythi San. 

As of June 29, there were about 150 confirmed cases of Covid-19 in Arakan State, and a diabetic woman in Sittwe became the first state fatality of the virus’s third wave on June 28. 

Multiple variants of the virus make up a growing proportion of the global Covid-19 caseload. But speaking at a press conference in Sittwe on June 28, the director of the Arakan State Department of Public Health said testing in Myanmar does not yet distinguish between the original strain and variants.