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As restrictions ease in Chandigarh, tracing contacts of Covid-19 cases becoming wild-goose chase
More people going out and about has left no foolproof system of tracing all persons who positive patients may have come in contact with.
With the lockdown restrictions removed and Covid-19 cases rising consistently, tracing community contacts of positive patients has become a Herculean task for the municipal corporation teams tasked with the job.
As the city gradually returns to normalcy, people are coming in contact with a number of strangers in the community, leaving no foolproof system of tracing all persons who positive patients may have come in contact with.
UT health secretary Arun Kumar Gupta says the person testing positive shares the name and other information of the people who they have met recently.
“These people are traced and home quarantined. Besides, a poster to this effect is pasted outside their houses. In a few cases, we also track their movement with the help of their mobile phones,” he adds.
But, this methodology helps only so much with people venturing out in public places without any restrictions.
For instance, a medical shop owner and its workers had tested positive for the virus earlier in June. The infection even spread to the workers’ family members in different parts of the tricity.
However, the contact tracing teams soon found out that it was next to impossible to trace all customers, who these workers may have served at the shop.
Similarly, an auto driver was found infected after he transported a Covid-19 positive patient to the hospital. Even though the auto driver’s family members tested negative, there is no clarity on the number of passengers he ferried in his vehicle after contracting the infection.
In another such case, a Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) constable, who is posted at the Punjab Civil Secretariat, took leave after testing positive for the virus. A resident of Daria village, he never developed any symptoms and continued to check visitors at the secretariat before isolating himself.
Simultaneously, a number of cases have cropped up where the health teams have no information with regard to the source of infection. Such cases have been reported from Sectors 24, 25, 43 and 47.
Anil Kumar Garg, MC additional commissioner-cum-nodal officer, MC contact tracing teams, say their focus is on quarantining the immediate contacts within six hours to contacin the spread of infection.
“People’s movement has returned to normal since the lockdown restrictions were removed. So, finding the source of infection and all community contacts is pretty difficult. However, our four teams are working hard it,” Garg says.
