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Due to our lack in many areas, the government's swift response to declare SoE and 14 days lock down was and is the only best way for us to avoid and contain the virus. We don't have the cure, nor proper isolation areas with adequate bed space, ventilation equipment, and even personal protective equipment (PPEs) for clinicians to use. That's the main reason why the nurses went on strike recently. It's a sad case at Pom Gen Hospital when they ran out of proper masks, gloves and hand sanitizer. The clinicians can work but they need to protect themselves also. The right mask to use is the N95 mask, which I last heard from a nurse was going for K100 on backmarket. Our clinicians unfortunately are using the surgical masks which are not quite effective against the virus. To make a hand sanitizer (WHO recommend), we'll need ethanol (or isopropyl alcohol), hydrogen peroxide and glycerol. Last week Monday I found a 125ml of glycerol which I made 5L of hand sanitizer and gave to the Pom Gen triage team, who are at the forefront of receiving patients. We've also given few of our snakebite equipment to the covid-19 team to use till they purchase their equipment. They are yet to buy equipment for covid-19 isolation camps. But it all depends on when the gov't secures funds. Above all, let's all do the best we can to help avoid viral infection. Washing hands and staying at home is paramount. It's also an eye-opener for the gov't to start investing in building local capacity in research, science and technology (RST), and not only on the extractive industry. The inconsistent results due to faulty equipment at IMR is a typical recipe for disaster. We need up-to-date state of the art equipment to get best results first hand and not after a series of inconsistent results. In such cases of national and global interest, there should be no room for error. The last I read was that the virus has mutated and now have strain S and strain L. (My opinion: If a local PNGan gets infected, and if it mutates to suit our genome, that's another story.) I'm entitled to my opinion and its not to put fear into anyone or any institution. Finally, it's possible to locally develop the test kit if we have the right equipment and capacity. Currently, they are trying to analyze samples using the real-time PCR machine at the IMR lab at UPNG Medical School. That's good news and I'm hoping this works. I salute the medical doctors and nurses who are out their working including lab techs of IMR and hospitals. For now, let's stand with our PM and pray and hope that no local would be infected with this virus. It's a death spirit working through fear, and we must conquer it first through prayer. God Protect Papua New Guinea.

I salute our prime minister for taking a bold step in declaring SOE in PNG immediately. It is still unclear yet the status of COVID-19 in our country, therefore we hope the Government in its upcoming sitting would extend the SOE. And this time really making sure that citizens are all locked down taking seriously this epidemic.... May God help us.

PNG Government has taken a full consideration of its people by declaring the SOE promptly. Oh what a caring government of the day! God is with PNG!

Compare Last years death rate from month ending March to This years March ending, and see if the death rate have increased count this year. This will confirm if we might actually have active cases in PNG. A call for a review on post mortems on relevant bodies deceased by a contributing symptom to the COVID-19 virus – if this can be done then the families of the identified deceased would be known as persons of interests.

Hi guys thanks for the comments, and update on the stats: 15 of the 16 people who had direct contact with the xo formed case have tested negative. 29,000 people entered PNG from overseas from January till the lockdown on 24 March. More than 2000 persons monitored in Port Moresby, and almost all 22 provinces have persons of interest being monitored. Some high risk areas include the PNG-Indonesian border, but also tourism hotspots like Tufi and Kokoda in Oro Province, Kimbe and Milne Bay. Oro has 11 persons of interest being monitored. Details have not been released, but those vulnerable would be villagers and rest house owners along the 96km Kokoda trail, and Tufi Dive Resort employees - these two combined have the highest tourist visits per year in PNG. On a different note, US & Indonesia underreported the cases until tests increased, revealing high numbers. We hope that is not the case with PNG.

This is how journalism should be in this country. Factual and unbiased. An interesting read worth sharing.

Hope your people will recover the situation ASAP

I agree with you

Looking at the statistics, us getting our first case through the Indonesian Border is high and I think if a significant portion of our security forces, immigration and health team are posted there, it should at least give us some bit of confidence. Thanks to the local MPs and Governors there who joined hands to fight the virus. Our founding fathers were so wise to have one International Portal of Entry in Jacksons Airport which we are at least good in screening our inbound travelers unlike America and other developed countries who are struggling to monitor and screen people coming inform all ports of entry. Our first imported case should have been easily detected because the guy was coming from Spain a densely infected country at the time of his travel. We could have quarantined all on board right there and then upon arrival. ... My fear is if we have local transmission even what we borrow from IMF or WB might not support us progressively to fight this virus with our own pressing needs to be attended to and a mildly deficit budget, man may the GOD of Heaven help us. Thanks for the day of prayer and fasting.

Thanks Peter, I don't have any data regarding donations to overseas NGOs unfortunately. I'm not using tax data. But overseas organisations don't have to report to the ACNC (the source of my data) nor to ACFID, the other data-source I use at times. Like you, I've donated to overseas NGOs in instances. My guess though is that such donations are not a large share of overall aid NGO donations from Australians. I have two reasons for believing this. 1. People like you and me, with a direct knowledge of development issues, and beliefs that lead us to donate directly to overseas NGOs at times, are a very small slice of the Australian population. The bulk of donations come in response to NGOs reaching out to the public. In Australia almost all of this reach is from Australia-based aid NGOs. 2. Donations in Australia are dominated by a few large organisations. I'm not aware of any non-Australia-based organisations that would be analogous in terms of size. All the really big INGOs have Australia branches/chapters/affiliates. Having said that, it's easy to imagine that in a globalised world, with easy internet access, direct international donations will be on the rise. It would be a fascinating topic for further study. Terence

If the government can spend millions of kina on THIS COVID-19 pandemic swiftly, then they can spend even more on killer diseases like TB, Aids, MALARIA, etc. Wow so frightening.....

I wonder how PNG could manage to gather all of these 25,262 people entered the country since January 7 for testing. What if 100 plus of them are with positive result, then we may think that thousands of people in PNG may have been infected already. It will be very hard to control off. This is an incurable disease and spread widely very quickly so please the government must do something to prevent further spreading. I am so glad with the government for quickly taking up appropriate approach in declaring a state of emergency (SOE) and lockdown of PNG for 14 days.