Bangladesh, China, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka have vowed to strengthen information sharing and coordination of policies and actions to cope with the impact of the second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Speakers at a webinar have said Bangladesh has been able to avert a big disaster by coronavirus due to the timely intervention of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.

The coronavirus crisis in Bangladesh is not going away anytime soon and it may take at least two to three years to disappear,  said Prof Dr Abul Kalam Azad, Director General of the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS).

Basanti Rani, a handloom artist from Sonargaon Upazila of Narayanganj District in Dhaka Division, makes handmade fan from yarns for a living. She lives with her family consisting of her only son, a daughter and a son-in-law. With the crafting assistance of her family members, she runs the family with earnings that come through selling the handmade fans.

Life or livelihood? That is the question facing millions and millions of people around the world today in an entirely unprecedented scenario for the modern, globalized world. But are the two truly mutually exclusive in the time of Covid 19? Or, can an accommodation be made to keep the search for livelihood as safe as possible from the point of view of health. Luckily, perhaps due to divine grace, Bangladesh has so far seen figures of infection and mortality which are far lower than might have been expected.

In a new framework released Monday as a roadmap to support countries' path to social and economic recovery, the United Nations called for an extraordinary scale-up of international support and political commitment to ensure that people everywhere have access to essential services and social protection.

Beijing and Washington should join hands to fight the COVID-19 pandemic and lead the world through the crisis, a senior diplomat said here on Saturday.

COVID-19 was likely spreading in several US cities "far earlier" than Americans knew, The New York Times reported citing a new research by Northeastern University.

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and United Enterprises & Co. Ltd (UECL) have jointly taken an initiative to provide food support to almost 5000 poor women in Jamalpur, Kurigram and Ganbandha districts.

All countries should contribute to international efforts to combat COVID-19, prioritizing people's life and health and rejecting any attempts to politicize the pandemic, Chinese Ambassador to the United States Cui Tiankai has said.