E-Paper
Ghaziabad: Health dept to widen net, trace more contacts of positive patients
The health department will widen the scope of contact tracing of Covid-19 positive patients in order to identify suspected cases. The officials said at present,
The health department will widen the scope of contact tracing of Covid-19 positive patients in order to identify suspected cases. The officials said at present, they have an average of about 4.5 contacts per patient and will scale this up further.
Health officials said they have received directions from the state government to increase the contact up to six or eight per Covid-19 patient. The district, till July 24, has a total of 4,441 Covid-19 cases and about 94% of the contact data of these patients has been uploaded to the state portal.
“We have received directions from the state government to trace at least 8 to 10 primary and secondary contacts of each Covid-19 patient. This will help us as more people will be tested subsequently. At present, our contact tracing is averaging 4.5 contacts per positive patient. So, we will now scale this up,” Dr NK Gupta, chief medical officer, Ghaziabad, said.
“Since rapid antigen kits are now available, contact tracing will be followed up by early testing. Increasing the contact tracing will finally help us to know how many more people are prone to the infection. More contact tracing and testing will help prevent the spread of Covid-19,” he said.
The contact tracing of a patient is taken up to ascertain the number of people (s)he had come in contact with about four or five days before (s)he tested positive for Covid-19. Such contacts are then told to remain in home quarantine and those showing symptoms of Covid-19 are also tested and sent to appropriate Covid facilities (if tested positive) for further treatment.
In Ghaziabad, contact tracing of Covid-19 patients is done with the help of six teams who speak to each patient over phone. The teams are stationed at a dedicated control room at the district headquarters. Another three-member team, comprising a police personnel and health workers, also visits the patient’s house for the purpose.
According to the statistics available with the health department, the district currently has about 3,200 patients with up to five contacts, 815 patients having six to eight contacts, 232 patients with 11 to 20 contacts and about 30 patients having more than 20 contacts.
“We have been able to upload about 94% of our manual contact tracing data on to the state portal. The rest will be updated within a day or two,” Ajay Shankar Pandey, district magistrate, Ghaziabad, said.
According to the uploaded data, the age group of 41-60 years has the highest number of contacts at 8,824. The age group of 0-20 years has 2,236 contacts while the age group of over 60 years has 1,964 contacts.
“The age group of 41-60 years has the highest number of contacts as this group is the most mobile -- they go to office daily and visit markets for household goods and chores. Senior citizens, for more obvious reasons, prefer to stay indoors and have the least number of contacts,” Dr VB Jindal, president of Indian Medical Association, Ghaziabad, said.
.
