Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya on Tuesday said the Centre’s team headed by the National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) had returned from Kerala and submitted its report, which mentions low vaccinations and strained healthcare infrastructure as problem points amid rising Covid cases in the state.
Mandaviya added that he had talked to Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan over the phone and discussed the matter. “I have also written a letter to CM Vijayan Pinarayi ji for taking more proactive measures and precautions to control the ongoing situation in Kerala. I have sought the State’s cooperation in managing the situation and have assured Central Government’s complete support,” he said in a tweet.
Amid a steep rise in Covid-19 cases, the Union government on Tuesday updated on the six-member Central team findings that visited Kerala last week.
Lav Agarwal, the Joint Secretary in the Union Health Ministry stated that a team headed by Dr Sujeet Singh, National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) and former Deputy Director-General of the Disaster Management Cell, and other public experts were sent to Kerala.
As of now, Kerala has been reporting a high number of Covid-19 infections even as the second wave is weaning off in most states. In the last week, 49.85 per cent of the total coronavirus cases in the country were reported from Kerala.
Meanwhile, the Central team when visited the Malappuram district found out that there was an upward trend in the test positivity rate. The current TPR in the Malappuram district is approximately 17.26% and the team has advised the district officials to increase active surveillance and contact tracing.
Agarwal added that the team has also found that the categorisation of districts based on test positivity rate into A, B, C and D. The restrictions on the districts have been imposed on the basis of these categories which have not shown expected results yet.
As per the Kerala government, places with TPR below 5% will be put under category A, areas with TPR between 5% and 10% will be put under category B, 10 to 15 % under category C. Category D will include places with more than 15% TPR.
Meanwhile, the team also found out that the dependency of testing is 20% on RT-PCR tests, while 80% of the samples are being tested via Rapid Antigen Tests (RATs). The Central team has suggested officials to ramp up efforts to conduct RT-PCR testing.
“It has been observed that those who are reporting symptoms, they are coming to get tested. But, India’s containment strategy says that where a cluster of cases has been reported, a containment zone is set up, around which a buffer zone is established,” Lav Agarwal said. “What is critical is the containment approach — that should be followed 100 percent on the field,” he added.
The team has also recommended that contact tracing should be done in a proper manner. Reportedly, In Malappuram, 91 percent of the cases are in home isolation, which means all family members are high-risk contacts and they need to be traced, Agarwal said.
The team has found that the contact tracing ratio in the district was found to be 1:1.15 when the Union government has recommended that the ratio be 1:15 or 1:20, Agarwal added. Those COVID-19 patients or contacts who have comorbidities should be encouraged to opt for institutional care, he said.
Further strengthening the structure, the team has also advised on ramping up health systems wherever glitches have been reported while giving extra effort on ramping up vaccinations.
on Tuesday, Kerala reported 23,676 new cases, 15,626 recoveries, and 148 deaths, taking the active caseload in the state to 1,73,221. The test positivity rate stands at 11.87%.
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