Bangladesh extends shutdown till May 5 as coronavirus crisis surge

23 April Dhaka : Bangladesh has extended its nationwide lockdown till May 5 as part of measures to stem the spread of coronavirus pandemic, local media reported on Thursday.

“Holidays will be extended till May 5 from April 26. The government will issue a gazette in this regard tomorrow [Thursday],” Bangladesh News reported after citing State Minister for Public Administration Ministry Farhad Hossain as saying. The minister, however, added that May 6 is also a government holiday on account of the religious rituals of the country’s minority Buddhist community, or Buddhist Full Moon holiday.

To ensure social distancing amid the COVID-19 pandemic, the government had declared a general holiday on March 26 for 10 days. Later, that was gradually extended till April 25 as the country kept seeing a rise in the number of cases and deaths from COVID-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus.

With the latest government decision to extend the lockdown again, the countrywide soft shutdown — restricting the movement of people, suspending all types of public transports and closing all businesses — is now set to cross the one-month mark next week.

The South Asian nation of more than 165 million population has so far reported 120 deaths from the virus as of Wednesday, with 3,772 confirmed cases and 92 recoveries.