The government of Maldives has developed and publicised a guideline on home quarantine.
The guideline publicised by Health Protection Agency (HPA) focuses on the procedures to be followed by those who are placed in home quarantine due to COVID-19. The guideline detailed who will be placed in home quarantine, the specifications required for houses to qualify for home quarantine and how the personal hygiene of people residing in such households should be maintained.
Furthermore, it details how the cleanliness of the households should be maintained, the responsibilities of the person being quarantined and other residents of the home. Guidelines on how to prevent and control infection, health practices to be followed by the person placed in quarantine are also mentioned in the guideline. The guideline covers the responsibilities of the social support desks, social response, and health cluster of the islands.
A person will be placed in home quarantine for 14 days. After that, the person will be released from quarantine if test results of COVID-19 come back negative.
An older adult above 60 years or a person with a chronic illness will be placed in home quarantine if there is a caretaker present at the home. It further states that the caretaker should not be a person above 60 years of age and should not be someone having a chronic illness. The patient placed in quarantine should not go out of the house and nor people from other households should visit the homes placed in quarantine.
Before the publication of the guidelines, health experts warned the public that if there is a surge in the numbers of positive cases, some people will have to be placed under home quarantine. As of Sunday, Maldives had recorded 1313 positive cases including 107 recoveries, and four fatalities.
