Author: bdadmin

President Abdul Hamid on Wedneaday expressed his condolence at the death of Priyatosh Sarkar, a senior lawyer of Kishoreganj Bar who fought along with the president in the 1971 War of Liberation.

The freedom fighter passed away at 7.35 am on Wednesday while undergoing treatment at President Abdul Hamid Medical College Hospital. He was 80.

The President prayed for the eternal peace of the departed soul and conveyed deep sympathy to his bereaved family.

Source: United News of Bangladesh

Unable to get the Covid-19 vaccine, a 32-year-old man allegedly thrashed the storekeeper of Atpara Upazila Health Complex in Netrokona on Tuesday.

Nurul Amin, the son of Gias Uddin Ahmed of Mobarakpur village in Atpara upazila, has been arrested, police said on Wednesday.

Upazila Health Complex sources said that the vaccination drive began at the centre on Tuesday morning but it ran out of Covid jabs by noon.

When Mirza Ataur Rahman Jewel, the storekeeper of the hospital, came out and announced the same to people who were in the queue to get the jab, Nurul got agitated and attacked him.

On information, police rushed to the spot and arrested Nurul.

Md Zafar Iqbal, officer-in-charge of Atpara Police Station, said a case was filed against Nurul in this regard. “He will be produced in a court on Wednesday,” he said.

Source: United News of Bangladesh

Sylhet division has logged 22 new Covid-related deaths in 24 hours till Wednesday morning, as the Delta variant of the deadly coronavirus continues to wreak havoc across the country.

Of the total deaths, 11 were reported in Sylhet district alone, according to health authorities.

According to the authorities, 557 new infections were detected in the division during the period. With the fresh figures, the total fatalities and cases in the division now stand at 844 and 47,011, respectively.

Besides, 82 people have been admitted to the corona unit of Sylhet Osmani Medical College and Hospital in the past 24 hours.

Currently, some 469 people are undergoing treatment at the hospital.

Source: United News of Bangladesh

Two people were killed in separate road accidents at Kuril Bishwa Road and Khilgaon areas in the capital.

The deceased were identified as Maraz,20 and Golam Rabbani,30.

Ruhul Amin, a cousin of Maraz, said that he was run over by a CNG-run autorickshaw at Kuril Bishwa Road around 11:30 am on Wednesday.

He was rescued and taken to a local medical facility at first. He was later referred to the emergency unit of Dhaka Medical College and Hospital where a doctor declared him dead at 3:30 pm.

Md. Bachchu Mia, in-charge inspector of DMCH police outpost ,said the body was kept in the hospital morgue for autopsy and the matter has been reported to Khilkhet police station.

In another road accident, a motorcycle passenger was killed as a CNG-run auto rickshaw hit a motorbike on Khilgaon flyover area of the capital.

The deceased was identified as Golam Rabbani, 30.

Motorcyclist Nur Mohammad (32) was slightly injured in the incident.

Rabbani was rescued in a critical condition and taken to the emergency department of Dhaka Medical College Hospital at 9.45 am where the duty doctor declared him dead, said Sabujbagh police sub-inspector SI Hasanuzzaman.

“The body has been kept in the morgue of the hospital for autopsy,” he added.

Road Accidents in Bangladesh

At least 2,329 people, including 291 women and 381 children, were killed and 4,361 others injured in 2,159 road accidents across the country in the first half of the current year, says a report published in July.

It says the road accidents took place on various highways, national, inter-district and regional roads between January 1 and June 30 across the country.

Shipping and Communication Reporters Forum (SCRF), a platform of journalists, prepared the report based on news carried by 22 national dailies, 10 regional newspapers and eight online news portals and news agencies.

Source: United News of Bangladesh

Health authorities said 213 new dengue patients have been admitted to different hospitals in 24 hours till Wednesday morning amid a spike in the mosquito-borne disease that spreads mainly during monsoon.

Some 907 patients diagnosed with dengue are receiving treatment in the country as of Wednesday morning, according to the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS).

Most cases have been reported in the capital.

Of them, 841 patients are receiving treatment at different hospitals in the capital while the rest were listed outside Dhaka.

Among the new patients,188 were admitted to the government and private hospitals across Dhaka.

Twenty two suspected dengue deaths were reported to the Institute of Epidemiology, Disease Control and Research (IEDCR) but it is yet to confirm any death from dengue yet, said DGHS .

Some 5,192 patients have been admitted to different hospitals with dengue since January – 4,263 of them have been released after recovery.

Dengue fever was first reported in Bangladesh in 2000, claiming 93 lives that year. In the years that followed, the country learned to deal with the disease much better, but it did become endemic. Fatalities almost fell to zero at one stage, before spiking again in 2018, leading to the horrific crisis the following year.

Source: United News of Bangladesh

Ten more people have died of Covid-19 and related complications at Rajshahi Medical College and Hospital (RMCH) in the past 24 hours, health officials said on Wednesday.

Three of them died of Covid, while four had symptoms of the virus and the remaining three succumbed to post-corona complications, said hospital director Brigadier General Shamim Yazdani.

Of the deceased, two each were from Rajshahi, Naogaon and Natore districts, three from Pabna and one from Chapainawabganj district.

Besides, 29 people have been admitted to the corona unit of the hospital in the past 24 hours. On the other hand, some 37 people were discharged from the hospital after recovery during the period.

Currently, 363 patients are undergoing treatment at the hospital, which has 513 beds. Of them, 20 are being treated in the ICU, said the hospital director.

RMCH has been one of the most stretched hospitals in the country during the second wave of Covid-19, particularly since the latter part of May when the deadly Delta variant was identified in multiple samples in Rajshahi division.

Source: United News of Bangladesh

UNHCR has welcomed the commencement of the vaccination of Rohingyas in Cox’s Bazar in line with national authorities’ broader public health efforts.

“We are grateful to the Government of Bangladesh for having included Rohingya refugees in the vaccination campaign,” said Johannes Van Der Klaauw, UNHCR’s Representative in Bangladesh, on Wednesday.

The UN refugee agency said equitable inclusion of Rohingyas in allocation of vaccines is critical to curbing the spread of the ongoing pandemic.

“The Rohingya refugee and host community volunteers have an essential frontline role in containing the spread of COVID-19 in the camps. The first step in fully protecting communities; however, is through the rollout of vaccination,” UNHCR’s Representative in Bangladesh emphasized.

On Tuesday, over 4,000 Rohingyas received their first COVID-19 vaccine, as part of a national vaccination drive to curb the spread of the deadly virus.

Rohingyas eligible for vaccination in the first cohort include some 48,000 individuals over 55 years of age. The drive will continue until August 17.

The vaccination drive for Rohingyas is being led by the Bangladesh authorities with technical support from the UN Refugee Agency, the World Health Organization and other humanitarian partners.

The fight against the pandemic has been led by thousands of refugee and host community volunteers, who have worked since 2020 on informing refugees about health and hygiene, monitoring any signs of illness, and connecting the refugee community with critical health services.

While the threat of COVID-19 remains critical, their efforts have helped to prevent and curb outbreaks and have saved lives, said the UN agency.

The vaccinations follow the devastating monsoon rains that hit Cox’s Bazar District over the past weeks, causing flash floods and landslides which killed eight Rohingya refugees and 15 Bangladeshis in the host communities.

Almost 25,000 refugees were displaced due to landslides, flooding, wind and storms.

Thousands of facilities have been damaged including primary health clinics, distribution points and latrines.

Access was hindered due to damage to roads, pathways and bridges.

UNHCR’s Emergency Response Teams, and partners, refugee and host community volunteers were deployed to assess the damage, to provide support to families forced to relocate, to begin immediate repairs of shelters and other site improvements and to ensure access to essential services for all.

While the weather has improved over the last few days, the monsoon season will continue for another couple of months followed by the cyclone season.

Source: United News of Bangladesh

These are very trying times for the media as public interest in usual issues are very low. Politics is gone and most are relieved because they say the same thing. Some politicians are still popular but that’s because they are amusing and make the audience smile loudly. People hardly care who has to say anything about anything.

While activist-journalists care about who rules Bangladesh and “dhandabaz” ones with whom to line up, for most media workers politics is a source of news. Now that politics is shut, news is shut too. How long can one report what the Opposition leader says about the ruling party’s failure to handle the Corona situation and the response of the ruling party that the Opposition doesn’t know what it’s talking about?

Economy never made much news because people are more busy making money or trying to survive than reading about it. As it is, most news is not positive with a corona hit economy so most stay away from reading them. Sometimes there is news but they are largely about people who have committed economic crimes but are now free for one reason or another or economic criminals but there are so many that the public no longer cares. However, a story with pics which show a criminal leading a fancy life abroad sitting on a sofa in his plush home is a better read than hearing about a group of hyper rich who just got off police charges as “ its ok now bro.” It happens so often that it’s no longer a crime, hence not news.

Sports and Sex

Sports news is fun but not opinions. We are nowhere in any sports except cricket, – one of the top 11 in a sport which 15 play- so we want to see and hear about it. The problem is we are only in one sport but the most popular sport is soccer which we play so badly, we don’t want to hear or know about it. So it’s basically international sports and we don’t care about local politics or sports barring cricket.

Which basically leaves “entertainment media”, always full of juicy stuff. And the crowd loves it. As of now we know practically everything about Porimoni and her crowd including gifts of qurbani cows though not enough about their patrons. A newspaper did publish a list of sorts and that led to screaming and jeering and a well-known banker-author was named who has denied any involvement. It was bad media or media desperate for anything about sex and scandals?

So was the Porimoni affair created by the authorities in partnership with the media to save the media industry now in trouble? But Porimoni as a source of news also has limits. So in view of the crisis, may we have Hurmoni please to keep us going when Porimoni ends?

Source: United News of Bangladesh