The country has a capacity for 5,000 COVID-19 patients and the number of patients exceeded 5,000 yesterday.
The health authorities are increasing the capacity of the hospitals under the second stage to handle more cases.
For example, the government announced it had converted the non-functioning Batticaloa Campus premises in Valachchanai into a hospital for COVID-19 with facilities for 1,200 patients.
Meanwhile, the cabinet co-spokesman Minister Ramesh Pathirana, a doctor by profession, said that the patients with less complications would be sent to selected quarantine centres. He said that 75 to 80 per cent of the COVID-19 patients had not shown symptoms.
