Role of defence forces of Sri Lanka during the covid-19 outbreak for nations branding

Abstract

World Health Organization (WHO) confirmed of a novel coronavirus on the 12th January 2020, as the cause of a respiratory illness in a cluster of people in Wuhan City, China. Even though the fatality ratio for coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is comparatively lower than SARS, the transmission is greater. Therefore, Sri Lankan government requested the general public to practice proper hygiene methods and selfquarantine methods to safeguard from this disease. Quarantine Law in Sri Lanka is governed by the Quarantine and Prevention of Disease Ordinance No 3 of 1897. Defence Forces of Sri Lanka played many roles in the fight against COVID-19 and this research is an overview of the contribution they have made towards battling the COVID-19 successfully. The purpose of this research is to identify the effectiveness of the measures taken by the Sri Lankan government and the tri forces to stop COVID-19 spreading, which will provide an example for other countries to follow on how to prepare, detect, and respond to similar outbreaks, which in turn will contribute towards Nations Branding. This research is a qualitative study mainly undertaken with content analysis of the information extracted from secondary data such as publications of the local and foreign governments, research reports from Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and World Health Organization (WHO), magazines, newspapers, TV programmes and websites. A few face-to-face and telephone conversations were also conducted with key personnel of the defence forces to obtain an in depth understanding and to clarify the accuracy of the results. The key contributions made by Sri Lanka Army (Army), Sri Lanka Navy (Navy) and Sri Lanka Air Force (SLAF) were identified in terms of its implications for Nations Branding and, recommendations are made which includes methods to adopt when dealing with COVID 19 in the future.