Rajiv Gauba
New Delhi: With 6 States – Maharashtra, Kerala, Punjab, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Gujarat- showing a surge in new cases in the last 24 hours, Cabinet Secretary Rajiv Gauba today asked States and Union Territories to maintain a continued rigorous vigil in terms of containing the spread of Coronavirus and to enforce COVID Appropriate Behaviour and deal firmly with violations.
Gauba chaired a high level review meeting with Chief Secretaries of Maharashtra, Punjab, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, West Bengal, Telangana and Jammu & Kashmir, and told them to follow effective surveillance and tracking strategies in respect of potential super spreading events.
The review meeting took stock of the surge in COVID cases in Telangana, Maharashtra, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Punjab, J&K and West Bengal. These States/Union Territories have been reporting a high active caseload or an increasing trend in new cases in the last week. A detailed presentation was made on the current status of COVID-19 in these States with a focus on districts reporting increasing number of new cases, increasing trend in positivity and having a concerning testing trends. This was followed by a comprehensive review with all the States/UTs. A need for effective testing, comprehensive tracking, prompt isolation of positive cases and quick quarantine of close contacts was emphasised during the meeting.
Maharashtra continues to report the highest daily new cases at 8,333. It is followed by Kerala with 3,671 while Punjab reported 622 new cases in the last 24 hours. In the last two weeks, Maharashtra has shown the highest rise in active cases from 34,449 on 14th of February to 68,810 currently.
The meeting to review and discuss the COVID management and response strategy, held through video conference, was attended by, besides the Chief Secretaries, senior health professionals of the States/UTs along with the Union Health Secretary, Director General of Indian Council of Medical Research (ICM), NITI Aayog Empowered Group members, and representatives from Home Ministry.
The Chief Secretaries also briefed about the current situation in the States and their preparedness to tackle the recent spike of COVID cases. They informed about the enforcement of COVID Appropriate Behaviour by levying heavy fines and challans, reviewing the surveillance and containment activities closely with the District Collectors, and other steps being taken in line with the guidelines provided by Union Health Ministry and Home Ministry.
After today’s meeting, the States were advised to take the following steps:
- Improve the overall testing in districts reporting reduction in testing
- Increase RT- PCR tests in states & districts having high antigen testing
- Refocus on surveillance and stringent containment in selected districts reporting reduced tests/high positivity and increased cases
- Monitor mutant strain & clustering of cases for early hotspot identification & control
- Focus on clinical management in districts reporting higher deaths
- Undertake priority vaccination in districts reporting higher cases
- Promote COVID-appropriate behavior ensure effective citizen communication to not let complacency set in, especially in light of vaccination drive entering the next phase; and enforcing stringent social distancing measures.
– global bihari bureau
