E-Paper
City starts door-to-door survey to tackle Covid
The questions in the survey will include details of residents and family members, health and vaccination details among other information, which will be entered into the BBMP software each day.
The Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP, the city’s civic body) on Monday rolled out its ambitious initiative to send door-to-door a team of health officials in India’s IT capital to monitor general health of residents, collect information and spread awareness on Covid-19 pandemic.
The move comes at a time when Bengaluru and the rest of Karnataka are staring at another wave of Covid-19 infections, which appears to be increasing with each passing day.
The scheme – “Palike Vaidyaru Nimma Mane Bagilige”(Palike doctors at your doorstep) – will have one doctor and one paramedical staff to collect information on Covid-19 symptoms and comorbidities by going door-to-door as well as provide advice to residents on health care.
“In the first phase, two wards each from assembly constituencies, 54 in total, have been chosen and the survey will start on 16 August 2021,” the BBMP said in a statement on Monday.
The questions in the survey will include details of residents and family members, health and vaccination details among other information, which will be entered into the BBMP software each day.
R Ashok, Karnataka’s revenue minister and in-charge of Bengaluru’s Covid-19 situation, on Monday said the new programme is part of an initiative to ensure safety of the city’s residents.
“The first (intent of the new initiative) is to ensure health for Bangaloreans. If anyone tests positive when our team reaches them, then arrangements will be made to move them to hospitals,” Ashok said.
He added that health officials will collect information on vaccination coverage and details of comorbidities--diagnosed and undiagnosed--and provide residents more targeted health care requirements.
Ashok said the team will reach 50 homes each day with a set of questions. He added that this will build confidence among the residents and reduce any instance of panic.
Bengaluru has seen the Covid-19 infections swing to extremes and was overwhelmed in the past two waves as the number of people requiring hospitals far exceeded the number of beds. The second wave, from around March this year, led to one of the worst crises the city and state has seen, when hospitals ran out of beds, oxygen, life-saving medicines and even space to cremate the dead as casualties increased.
Karnataka and Bengaluru reported 1,065 and 270 new Covid-19 cases on Monday, respectively. A total of 28 deaths due to the infections were reported from the state on Monday, taking the toll to 37,007, according to the state health department’s daily bulletin.
The former chief minister BS Yediyurappa-led government was criticised for its mishandling of the Covid-19 crisis and prioritising election and politics, adding to the challenges that the state had to overcome since the beginning of the pandemic around March last year.
The new government under chief minister Basavaraj Bommai has been trying to prioritise Covid-19 management but has faltered in putting an end to political events where hundreds and thousands of people gather to be part of mega events like distribution of ration kits and, ironically, raising awareness on the pandemic.
The Bommai government has imposed strict rules like weekend curfew in districts bordering with Kerala and Maharashtra and a night curfew across the state including in Bengaluru.
Gaurav Gupta, the chief commissioner of the BBMP, said the initiative was part of the preventive measures in the city. He said the administration has brought down the threshold of 10 Covid-19 patients to just three to declare it as a micro-containment zone. He said the BBMP was in touch with over 1,000 apartment complexes with over a million homes in total to ensure that there is enough monitoring of the Covid-19 situation.
Bengaluru has 198 wards as on date and Ashok said all wards will be part of their drive within one month.
