Malé, Maldives — The Ministry of Finance revealed on Wednesday that they have distributed MVR 33.2 million as allowances to the workers that are serving on the frontline of Maldives’ COVID-19 response.
Chief Financial Budget Executive of the Finance Ministry, Ahmed Saruvash stated at a press conference that the payments were disbursed for services rendered between March 7 and July 15. He also added that the pending MVR 300,000 allowances would be handed out to 41 frontline workers within this week as well.
There are three categories the frontliners are divided into based on specific risk levels, according to Saruvash.
First category is for those who are at the highest risk of infection. Those who are in this category are the individuals who come into direct contact with infected Covid-patients, such as doctors, nurses, sample collectors, laboratory technicians, those who operate the vehicles in which positive and suspected individuals are transferred and also those who enter Covid-19 treatment facilities. Those who work in this category are handed out an allowance of MVR 500 for every working day.
After this are the medium risk frontliners in the second category. These include of those who have to work with high-risk individuals although they do not come into contact with COVID-19 patients. These people will receive a daily allowance of MVR 250 for every working day.
The frontliners who do not fit into any of these categories but work in the now-defunct National Emergency Operation Centre for over six hours a day recieve an allowance of MVR 200.
Maldives currently has a total of 8,140 confirmed Covid-19 cases and 2,767 of them remain as active cases. While 5,338 people have completely recovered from the virus, 28 people have passed away from it in the country.
There has been a surge in the number of confirmed cases in Maldives recently, with majority of the confirmed cases being of Maldivian citizens, mainly coming from the greater Malé area.
