CORONAVIRUS: ‘Everything that should have happened hasn’t happened’ - Martina Anderson

Ms Anderson was speaking amid widespread concern that senior members of the NI Executive is still refusing to back immediate closure of schools, and have also not carried out widespread testing, in contrast to the other countries and regions across the world.

There have also been concerns that not everyone who reports having symptoms have been tested in the north.

There are now 52 confirmed cases in Northern Ireland with 1,171 tests carried out. This equate to 0.62% per cent of the population here.

Questions have also previously been raised as to why authorities here are not giving any information about where cases that are diagnosed are located in Northern Ireland, which some health bodies said was to protect patient confidentiality.

Ministers in certain departments have said they are following expert and scientific guidance with regards to the decisions being taken in Northern Ireland.

However in a post on Facebook, Ms Anderson said that “despite the World Health Organisation with 7000 scientists calling on Ministers to... Act Fast; Have No Regrets; and Be the 1st Mover, in the north of Ireland there has been... No closure of schools - (YET) No TESTING, TESTING, TESTING & unfortunately unlikely to be TESTING, TESTING, TESTING”.

“Everything that should have happened hasn’t happened,” she said, while criticising the handling of the situation by certain departmental heads.

“Stay Safe you lot - you are the important people x,” Ms Anderson said.