With 2,856 people of the State, who have returned from abroad during the last 14 days untraceable by district surveillance teams, Odisha government has asked all collectors and municipal commissioners to focus on surveillance and contact tracing of people who have returned from coronavirus affected areas.
“These persons could infect others unless home quarantined,” said Odisha health secretary Nikunja Bihari Dhal asking the officials to contact them at the earliest to ensure their home quarantine.
The state surveillance teams have so far identified 167 people, who came in contact with the three Covid-19 patients in the state, including 112 contacts of the latest patient.
Dhal said active surveillance is the foundation of prevention and containment. The three most important pillars of the state’s containment strategy is active surveillance, risk-based testing and quarantine of contacts of confirmed cases irrespective of symptoms, he said.
Odisha has so far seen only three Covid-19 cases after testing of 370 samples.
Also read: Odisha suggests release of 1700 inmates to decongest jails
In a related development, the Odisha government has decided to provide extensive training to medical students so that they can be deployed in case of any emergency arising out of the coronavirus outbreak.
{{/usCountry}}In a related development, the Odisha government has decided to provide extensive training to medical students so that they can be deployed in case of any emergency arising out of the coronavirus outbreak.
{{/usCountry}}As the treatment and management of Covid-19 cases require extreme caution and professionalism, the state government is planning to impart necessary training to the medical students as per the prescribed protocols.
The state government decided that seventh, eighth and ninth-semester students of medical colleges will be trained so that they could be deployed in case a need arises.
Private medical colleges have also been asked to train their doctors and students simultaneously.