Salute! Staged A Demonstration Against Military Coup, Myanmar Health Workers Continue To Treat COVID-19 Patients

Vaccine illustration. (Steven Cornfield / Unsplash)

JAKARTA - Government hospital health workers across Myanmar have agreed to carry out an action against the Myanmar military coup starting Wednesday, January 3.

The rally was attended by thousands of doctors, nurses, and other staff from more than 100 government hospitals and health departments across Myanmar.

Despite the demonstration, they remain professional and carry out their duties to serve sick patients, including COVID-19 patients. This is as expressed by the Director of the Epidemiology Unit of the Ministry of Health and Sports of Myanmar, Dr. Khin Khin Gyi.

She said that hospital staff can treat existing COVID-19 patients because the cases have decreased and only about 10 thousand patients are currently being treated.

"We are still successfully treating patients. People don't have to worry," she told The Irrawaddy.

In addition, health workers in Myanmar are also continuing the COVID-19 vaccination program. Dr. Gyi said, as many as 80 thousand of the 110 thousand health workers who are at the frontline of handling COVID-19, have received their first vaccine injection.

Then, MPs also received their first vaccinations on January 29. As for the second dose, these MPs will receive a vaccine 28 days after the first.

"We will start public vaccination starting February 5. Parents with underlying conditions across the country will be vaccinated in advance to reduce deaths from COVID-19," she said.

On January 22, Myanmar received a vaccine from India in the form of 1.5 million doses of Covishield for 750,000 people, with two doses per person.

"About 260,000 doses of vaccine are planned for health care staff, volunteers on the front lines of COVID-19, all lawmakers and senior government figures. About 1.2 million remaining doses of vaccine will be given to the public," she said.

To note, the Ministry of Health of Myanmar has ordered 30 million doses of Covishield from the Serum Institute of India, with 2 million doses due on February 10.

Meanwhile, about 20 percent of Myanmar's 54.4 million citizens will receive the vaccine under the Covax global vaccine procurement program initiated by the World Health Organization (WHO). The first batch is planned to arrive at the end of February.

Since December 19, Myanmar has seen a decrease in COVID-19 cases. Fewer than 500 cases are now reported per day, down from a peak of 1,400 cases in the previous months. As of Wednesday, Myanmar reported 140,927 cases of COVID-19, including 3,160 deaths and 126,384 recoveries.