10-12% of Covid-19 cases reported in district are from rural areas: Collector

The district collector has been meeting village sarpanches and also Covid-19 care facilities created at the rural parts of the district

After the lockdown orders in both Pune and Pimpri-Chinchwad to contain the spread of Sars-Cov-2 virus which causes the Covid-19 (coronavirus) infection, the district administration is now working on war-footing to ensure that the same situation does not arise in rural Pune.

Police take action against people who were not wearing masks, helmets at Swargate in Pune, India, on Monday, July 13, 2020. (HT PHOTO)

The district collector has been meeting village sarpanches and also Covid-19 care facilities created at the rural parts of the district.

Naval Kishore Ram, district collector, said, “Almost 10-12 per cent of the cases reported from the district are from the rural areas. We are worried that this ratio might change and that more cases may start coming up from rural areas too.”

“We are focusing on contact tracing at least 20 people for every positive person. We have started decentralized swab collection too,” he said.

As of July 12, as per the district health office, out of the 38,502 positive cases, 3,593 are from rural areas and out of the 1,075 deaths, 94 are from rural areas.

Haveli which is also one of the largest talukas in the district is also one of the most affected areas. Out of the 1,989 cases that have been reported from all the 13 talukas, 803 are from Haveli alone including also 15 deaths. Followed by Khed (252), Mulshi (205) and Junnar (132) which also have some of the major industries.

Ayush Prasad, zilla parishad, chief executive officer, said, “All the cases reported in rural areas are of those who are either travelling to the city for providing essential services or live in the bordering areas of the city or along the highway.”

“There is a nominal local transmission, it would not be accurate to say that there is a rise in the number of cases as it is in proportion to the rise in the number of cases found across the district. Out of the 1,405-gram panchayats, 290 are affected,” he said.

“We are now increasing our testing capacity and contact tracing. The lockdown in both these civic bodies will have a impact on rise in cases in rural Pune. We are treating the entire village as a containment zone even if we find more than five cases,” said Prasad.

The collector in his meeting with officials from ZP laid down a multi-level pronged strategy to keep a check on the rising cases. The steps include ramping up testing from eight-nine contacts to 21 contacts. All high-risk contacts who could have possibly come in contact with the positive person in the past ten days are searched for and then tested while all the low-risk contacts are quarantined. Almost 1.55 lakh people are quarantined at the same time right now across the rural areas. A contact tracing team will be placed at each village level which was earlier only at taluka level.

Every contact traced is also cross-checked with those recorded as a comorbid patient and then tested accordingly.

Taluka haveli which is one of the worst affected will get 12 more hospitals which would be dedicated Covid-19 care centres for those showing moderate symptoms which will add 1700 more beds.

For emergency care, the administration has hired 1,389 medical professionals and will be adding 23 more ambulances to the existing 41 ambulances.