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Mobile-based application to be launched for contact tracing
26 Oct, 2020
By Vyshnavy Velrajh
A mobile-based application is to be launched for contact tracing and to warn users of coronavirus high risk areas.
Head of the the National Operations Centre for the Prevention of COVID-19 (NOCPC), Army Commander Lieutenant General Shavendra Silva told Colombo Gazette that the application will have a number of features.
He said that among the features, the application will help warn users of high risk areas.
The application will be introduced in the near future, he said.
The Army Commander added that the application is being launched on the instructions of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa.
Recently, the authorities faced difficulties in tracing contacts of people linked to the Minuwangoda coronavirus cluster.
The idea of creating a mobile app for contact tracing had been discussed over the past several months.
In June a team of researchers headed by Professor Chandana Jayaratne of the Astronomy and Space Science Unit, Department of Physics of the University of Colombo developed an app under a COVID-19 pandemic prevention Research Grant from the National Research Council.
Professor Chandana Jayaratne had said at the time that the app can provide real-time protection with information privacy and can be downloaded free of charge by the public. (Colombo Gazette)
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