Bangladesh to impose week-long air travel ban after COVID surge | Coronavirus pandemic News

All international and domestic flights to be banned for a week from Wednesday, coinciding with another lockdown amid spike in scenarios.

Bangladesh has declared ideas to ban all intercontinental and domestic flights for a 7 days from Wednesday, coinciding with yet a different lockdown to counter a spike in novel coronavirus infections.

All international passenger flights to and from Bangladesh will remain suspended from April 14 to 20, the Civil Aviation Authority of Bangladesh (CAAB) said on Sunday.

Additional than 500 flights will be cancelled for the reason that of the ban, claimed the CAAB’s Air Vice Marshal M Mafidur Rahman.

Domestic passenger flights and chartered helicopter flights are bundled in the suspension, while some exceptions may perhaps be made for clinical evacuations, humanitarian aid and cargo flights, the aviation authority stated.

A surge in COVID-19 scenarios because March prompted the authorities to implement a nine-working day nationwide shutdown until finally Tuesday, to be adopted by nonetheless a further 7-working day lockdown from Wednesday to gradual the unfold of the virus.

The authorities imposed a ban on air passengers from Europe and 12 other countries on April 3. Passenger flight operations on domestic routes ended up suspended on April 5.

Ex-PM assessments positive

Meanwhile, Bangladesh’s former Primary Minister Khaleda Zia has examined good for the novel coronavirus, her oppositional Bangladesh Nationalist Social gathering (BNP) said on Sunday.

Zia has been asymptomatic and was doing well, Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir, a senior leader of the BNP, advised a news briefing, urging individuals to pray for her.

The 74-12 months previous politician has been below the supervision of her personal medical professionals at dwelling in Dhaka ever given that she was launched from jail immediately after the govt of Primary Minister Sheikh Hasina suspended her jail term on health grounds in March very last yr.

Zia, a a few-time primary minister in the 1990s and 2000s, had been in prison given that February 2018 just after a court sentenced her to 5 years in jail for misappropriating money meant for orphans. A greater court docket later on doubled the time period.

Eight other personnel users of her property have also been examined good for the COVID-19, according to her physician Mohammad Al Mamun.

Bangladesh, which noted its initial circumstances of the novel coronavirus very last March, documented its optimum one-day boost in bacterial infections on Friday, with 7,462 scenarios. So significantly, the state has documented some 684,756 situations and 9,739 fatalities.

The South Asian country previously imposed a nationwide shutdown for much more than two months commencing March 2020.