Wednesday, June 3, 2020

Government spends Rs 125 million per day to fight Covid-19

The government has spent Rs 125 million per day – in the last 80 days – to fight Covid-19 pandemic, though the number of coronavirus has crossed over 2,000.
The government has spent almost Rs 10 billion to prevent and contain the spread of Coronavirus (Covid-19), confirmed secretary at the Office of Prime Minister and Council of Ministers Narayan Prasad Bidari.
“Of the total amount, some Rs 9.87 billion has been spent in setting up quarantine facilities, importing health equipment and distributing relief materials,” he said, adding that the amount does not include the total capital spent by local governments.
The federal government has spent Rs 6.03 billion, while provincial and local governments have spent Rs 1.08 billion and Rs 2.76 billion, respectively,” he said, adding that the exact amount spent by the local governments is yet to come. Though the government has imposed lockdown to contain the coronavirus since March 24 and has extended – for the eighth time – till June 14, people are still complaining of the shoddy quarantine facilities, corruption in importing health equipment and distributing relief materials to the political cadres.
A meeting of the high-level committee – formed to prevent and contain the novel coronavirus disease – has publicised the amount spent by three tiers of the government, today.
Meanwhile, the committee held discussions with health officials on the ways to ease the nationwide lockdown. The committee is going to recommend the government to ease the lockdown in several phases with zoning. The private sector has been pressuring the government to ease the lockdown as they have been hit hard by the lockdown of last 72 days, though the government has been working on to contain the coronavirus since last 80 days.
As of today, Nepal reported a total of 2,300 Covid-19 cases and with nine deaths as a result of Covid-19 infection.

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