To ensure an early detection of deadly coronavirus (COVID-19) in one’s body and seek help to get cured, Dhaka city unit of Bangabandhu Parishad has launched a self-test app.

A person with minimum IT expertise can have the self-test by giving answers to some simple questions in yes or no.

“With early detection, the ‘COVID-19 SELF TEST’ app is also going to provide some advices also. If the symptoms are found little or medium, the person is being advised to take rest and take the test again after two days. If the symptoms are found severe, the person is being advised to take RT-PCR test, most reliable and recognized test to diagnose COVID-19,” organization’s convener Sardar Mahmud Hasan Rubel said.

If the app detects anyone with severe symptoms, and no doctor is found to attend the patient, the organization is giving that person service through telephone.

“We are providing the service from 9am to 12pm and we think for the time being, it is our main programme of the Mujib Year,” Rubel further said.

Replying a question on how the app is going to make early detection of the virus without proper diagnosis, Rubel said they have launched the app to take the primary test from home, so that the concerned person can have a primary idea through general symptom analysis, whether he or she has been infected by the virus.

“Although the virus transmission in our country has not gone to an epidemic stage, but people are becoming panicked. People with normal flue or cough are running for diagnosis in facilities, treating COVID-19 patients, raising the risk of getting infected by the deadly virus. So we have made the app to give people an opportunity to made early detection from their respective homes,” he added.

The Bangabandhu Parishad leader said the app is discouraging people to rush to medical facilities for little or no symptoms of COVID-19, adding, “We want only coronavirus patients to go to hospitals and take treatment”.

The Dhaka city unit of Bangabandhu Parishad is running awareness and assisting campaign to tackle COVID-19 crisis from the second week of March. They are distributing face masks and hand sanitizers among general people.

Apart from these, the organization is lending helping hands to people those become workless amid this general holiday declared by the government. They have also distributing personal protective equipment (PPEs) among doctors and different materials to different social and religious institutions.

The Dhaka city unit of the organization is conducting their activities in capital’s Kalabagan, Karwanbazar, Dhanmandi, Hazaribagh, Demra, Motijheel and Bongshal areas.

Any person can get the help of the app by clicking on the link below