Centre tells states to identify, earmark hospitals to deal with Covid-19 cases

New Delhi: Cabinet secretary Rajiv Gauba on Tuesday asked state governments to immediately identify and earmark hospitals to deal with the corona virus outbreak

New Delhi: Cabinet secretary Rajiv Gauba on Tuesday asked state governments to immediately identify and earmark hospitals to deal with the corona virus outbreak and step up surveillance and contact mapping.

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In a letter to chief secretaries of all the states, Gauba said all states should immediately identify hospitals dedicated for management of Covid-19 cases and ensure that they are in a state of full readiness to deal with the situation in the event of a further spike in number of confirmed cases.

“I would request you to personally review the action in respect of surveillance and contact tracing measures as well as identification and preparation of dedicated hospitals,” he said.

As more cases of people jumping quarantine or not revealing their travel history have come to notice, Gauba reiterated the need to step up surveillance.

He told the chief secretaries to “suitably supplement” the state and district surveillance teams as well as the rapid response teams. “It is absolutely essential that surveillance and contact tracing of all positive cases is taken up and no suspected or high-risk person is left out. It is important that while these tasks are being monitored at the state level by the state health secretaries, this activity is directly and regularly monitored at the district level by the district magistrates, involving the official machinery available in the district,” the letter says.

Earlier this week, the union government announced restrictions on the movement of non-essential passenger transport including suspension of inter-state transport buses, Metro, rail services, domestic flights and inter state passenger transport till March 31.