Noida, Ghaziabad told to intensify Covid-19 testing, surveillance

NOIDA: In the wake of the surge in Covid-19 cases in states such as Maharashtra, Karnataka and Punjab, the Uttar Pradesh government has instructed all the districts, including Gautam Budh Nagar and Ghaziabad, to intensify the contact tracing, surveillance and vaccination

NOIDA: In the wake of the surge in Covid-19 cases in states such as Maharashtra, Karnataka and Punjab, the Uttar Pradesh government has instructed all the districts, including Gautam Budh Nagar and Ghaziabad, to intensify the contact tracing, surveillance and vaccination.

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In a video conference with all the district magistrates and divisional commissioners of the state on Monday evening, chief secretary Rajendra Kumar Tiwari said that there is a surge in Covid-19 cases again in many states like Maharashtra, Kerala, Punjab, Karnataka and Delhi, which could be the second or third wave of infection.

“Apparently, there is a slight uptick in cases recently in some districts such as GB Nagar and Ghaziabad, which is a sign of caution. Be vigilant as Delhi and adjoining areas are seeing a sudden surge in the number of cases. Though we are giving the fight to the pandemic with vaccination, we are not in a position to lower our guard. It is advisable for the districts concerned to intensify the vaccination of eligible individuals,” Tiwari said.

In March so far, as many as 146 new cases were detected in GB Nagar, while 144 new cases reported in Ghaziabad, witnessing a rise of almost 50% over the same period last month, according to the state health bulletin. In GB Nagar, the number of total positive cases was 25,686 on March 16, of which 78 were active and the positivity rate was 0.30%. Similarly, in Ghaziabad, the total positives went to 26,902 (102 active cases) with a positivity rate of 0.37% on March 16.

The chief secretary further said that these districts need to intensify their contact tracing and surveillance to check spread of the infection as thousands of people from other states come daily there. “The district health department should take the list of passengers and conduct their proper testing and contact tracing. A thorough surveillance is the need of the hour,” Tiwari said.

Tiwari also said that all the districts must ensure 100% vaccination of health-care and front-line workers, who missed the inoculation due to some reasons. “It is mandatory for all the districts to ensure 100% registration of senior citizens and persons over 45 years with co-morbidities. To ensure their inoculation, the vaccination booths must not be far away from their residences,” he said.

Ghaziabad district magistrate Ajay Shankar Pandey said that contact tracing and surveillance have been intensified to check further spread of infection. “We’ve also restarted issuing challans against those who are flouting the social distancing and mask norms in the district,” he said.

GB Nagar DM Suhas LY said that the health officials have been asked to increase the tracing and testing in the district. “Since vaccination can be the best way to protect us from the infection, the vaccination officials have been asked to increase the inoculation of eligible beneficiaries,” he said.

In GB Nagar, the health department has inoculated over 36,277 people in March so far, out of 65,048 beneficiaries belonging to senior citizens and 45-plus with comorbidities, which is 55.76% of the target.