Bangladesh has collected United States (US)-made 250 ventilators, an essential treatment gear for COVID-19 patients, following the directives of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.

As per the premier’s instructions, a group of expatriate Bangladeshi physicians residing in the USA and Canada, led by Dr Ziauddin Ahmed, collected the mobile ventilators for Bangladesh at free of cost from a US-based charity organization.

The US organization sent several hundreds of ventilators to an Indian organization named ‘HealthCube’ of which 250 ventilators were allocated for Bangladesh.

Following the directives of Bangladesh Prime Minister’s Office and foreign ministry, the Bangladesh mission in New Delhi collected the ventilators from HealthCube and sent those to Dhaka by a Biman Bangladesh Airlines cargo flight on Saturday night.

Foreign secretary Masud Bin Momen, health service division secretary Lokman Hossin Mia and Prime Minister’s personal physician Professor Dr ABM Abdullah received the ventilators at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport (HSIA) here.

Prof Abdullah, who coordinated the shipment, said these ventilators could be used up at the union level and even at the ambulance as these are portable one.

He extended heartfelt thanks to Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina for her instructions to this end, and also praised the expatriate Bangladeshi physicians for their noble efforts in collecting these much-needed ventilators for critical COVID patients.