Public health Bahrain’s ‘top priority amid pandemic’
Bahrain’s top priority has been the health of citizens and residents while dealing with the Covid-19 pandemic, said Finance and National Economy Minister Shaikh Salman bin Khalifa Al Khalifa.
He was speaking at the Sovereign Investor Forum, held virtually by Standard Chartered Bank on the sidelines of the 2020 Annual Meetings of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank Group.
A number of international investors and clients of sovereign funds took part in the webinar.
The minister reviewed the government’s proactive measures and plans to limit the repercussions and economic impacts, and highlighted the initiatives implemented to preserve people’s health and safety and maintain economic growth.
“The kingdom’s strategy was flexible, which enabled it to deal with all stages of the virus spread in accordance with the developments that occur at all levels,” Shaikh Salman said.
“The kingdom intensified its preventive efforts by following the “Trace, Test and Treat” strategy aimed at rapidly discovering cases and speeding up their treatment, which contributes to speedy recovery of cases.”
Milestone
“Bahrain is the third in the world in the rate of daily tests for every 1,000 people, and to date more than a million and a half tests have been conducted.”
He affirmed Bahrain has provided free treatment for all, adding that more initiatives aimed at protecting everyone will be launched.
The minister noted that the national economy had posted remarkable growth in the third quarter across many sectors, and it is expected to continue achieving the required rates of positive growth based on a number of economic indicators.
“Bahrain launched a BD4.3 billion financial stimulus package to support economic diversification by injecting the necessary liquidity to the private sector and helping its employees and companies, which contributed to mitigating the effects of the pandemic. It also protected jobs by paying salaries of the citizens working in the private sector during the first three months.”
