Sri Lanka to lift nationwide curfew on Monday

Sri Lanka will lift the nationwide curfew imposed to stem the spread of the coronavirus on Monday, police said as the total number of infections in the country surged past 400.

The island nation reported its highest number of 49 infections in a single day on Friday. A new cluster was reported as a Sri Lankan Navy facility was found to have 30 COVID-19 cases. The country has till Friday recorded 414 cases with 7 deaths. Over 100 of them have fully recovered.

In a statement issued on Saturday, police said that the curfew will be lifted at 5 am on April 27. There was no indication on its re-imposition. However, analysts say the curfew could be re-imposed as a new statement is expected to be issued by the authorities over the weekend.

Sri Lanka has been under a 24-hour curfew since March 20 to combat the deadly viral infection. The government had on Monday dropped its decision to relax the nationwide curfew and extended it to April 27 following a sudden spike in the number of COVID-19 cases.

However, there has been intermittent lifting of the curfew in selected areas which were not seen as dangerous for the spread of the deadly virus. Health officials said that during this week, they have increased the PCR (Polymerase Chain Reaction) tests and the aim is to conduct around 100 PCR tests per day.