E-Paper
Coronavirus crisis: Punjab extends curbs; PM Modi to meet CMs today
Covid-19 update: Punjab chief minister Amarinder Singh suggested the spike of secondary infections in the state indicated it had; the Union health ministry continued to deny it; and the World Health Organization (WHO) bracketed India in the category of a “cluster of cases”.
With Prime Minister Narendra Modi scheduled to hold his third video conference with chief ministers on Saturday to discuss the coronavirus pandemic, including reviewing the lockdown, which ends on April 14, Punjab became the second state — after Odisha — to extend the lockdown till the end of the month. The Union government has also asked for strict enforcement of the current lockdown, and reached out to states to assess if some categories of services and people needed to be exempted, in a sign that a set of restrictions will continue to be in place.
With the number of positive cases in India growing to 7,556 — Friday witnessed 850 new cases — a fresh debate also broke out on whether the country has entered the stage of community transmission. Punjab chief minister Amarinder Singh suggested the spike of secondary infections in the state indicated it had; the Union health ministry continued to deny it; and the World Health Organization (WHO) bracketed India in the category of a “cluster of cases”, which is a stage before community transmission.
In Punjab, CM Singh chaired a meeting of the council of ministers, which decided to extend the lockdown to check the community spread of the pandemic and to prevent overcrowding at the mandis in the light of the ensuing wheat harvesting and procurement season, an official statement said.
Singh said in a tweet, “Given the seriousness of the situation arising out of #Covid19, Cabinet has decided to extend lockdown & curfew till May 1.” He told the media that most of the 27 positive cases reported in Punjab on Thursday (the maximum daily increase for the state) were those of secondary transmission and expressed apprehension that the state may be entering the community transmission stage of the outbreak. Odisha had, on Thursday, extended the lockdown to April 30.
Back in Delhi, there was a spurt of activity within the government. The Union health minister, Harsh Vardhan, chaired a meeting of state health ministers. He urged them to ensure that the lockdown was strictly followed — failing which India would find it hard to battle the pandemic. “I request health ministers of all states to ensure that lockdown is followed 100% in your respective states. If we lag behind in this, it will be difficult for us to win this fight against Covid-19,” he said.
The Centre has constituted 10 high-level multi-disciplinary central teams to help states from where high number of cases are being reported. The teams have been rushed to Bihar, Rajasthan, Gujarat, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Telangana, and Uttar Pradesh, to aid them in containment preparedness, hospital preparedness and ventilator management.
“The minister assured all help, including providing adequate supply of personal protection equipment (PPE), N-95 masks and ventilators, in all states. A detailed discussion was also held among the group of ministers yesterday [Thursday] on the existing lab strategy, especially how to increase sampling in hot spots and clusters,” informed Lav Agarwal, joint secretary, health ministry, during a media briefing
Separately, the Union home ministry reached out to states and asked whether more categories of people and services need to be exempted, officials familiar with the development said on Friday. This is being widely interpreted as a sign that the lockdown will continue in some form — but may see the staggered re-emergence of certain more segments of people, as indicated by PM Modi in his last video conference with the chief ministers.
A review meeting was also held by the Prime Minister’s Office during the day on various efforts to check the coronavirus spread, including the production of PPEs, the absence of which has emerged as a key obstacle in securing health workers who are in direct contact with patients.
Meanwhile, despite the Punjab CM’s statement on possible community transmission, and the fact that data from an Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) study said that samples of about 2% of the Severe Acute Respiratory Infections (Sari) cases lifted from within the community had tested positive for Covid-19, the health ministry reiterated that there was no community transmission.
“If there is community transmission in the country then we will be the first ones announcing it, as we would need people to take extra precautions,” said Lav Agarwal. The WHO also put India in a category named “cluster of cases” — a notch below the community transmission stage and a classification used by the global body for cases “clustered in time, geographic location and/or by common exposures”.
