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Centre to assist States having insufficient health infrastructure

In the wake of rising cases of omicron, the Centre on Thursday decided to send its teams to States with low vaccination, rising cases, insufficient health infrastructure to assist them. This decision was taken in a high-level meeting chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

“In view of the new variant, we should be Satark (vigilant) and Saavdhan (cautious),” PM said while asking officials to ensure that the health systems in the States, beginning from the district level, are strengthened.

He said that Government is alert and seized of the Evolving scenario. “It continues to take proactive action and supporting States in their efforts of containment and management under the ‘Whole of Government’ approach,” he said. Further, he directed that focus should be on prompt and effective contact tracing, ramping up of testing, accelerating vaccination and strengthening health infrastructure.

PM briefed
Officials briefed the Prime Ministerabout the emerging scenario giving an overview of a surge in Omicron cases in countries having high vaccination coverage. He was also apprised of the Technical Brief and priority actions recommended by WHO in the context of Omicron.

A snapshot of the status of Covid19 and Omicron in the country, including States, districts and clusters that are reporting a higher number of cases respectively, was presented to Prime Minister. The details of the Omicron cases, including travel history, vaccination status, and recovery status were also presented.

The Prime Minister was briefed of the various actions taken since November 25 such as revised travel advisory for international passengers, review meetings with States/UTs on Covid-19 public health response measures, ramping up vaccination, installation of oxygen supply equipment.

PM Modi directed the officials to maintain a high level of vigil and alertness at all levels. He said it is important for States to ensure that the oxygen supply equipments are installed and fully functional. He directed the officials to work with the states on a regular basis and review the status of preparedness of health infrastructure including training and building of human resources, timely availability of ambulances, to operationalise Covid facilities for institutional quarantining, and supervised monitoring of those in home isolation and the effective use of IT tools for telemedicine and tele-consultation.

Heightened and close monitoring of emerging clusters and hotspots through and active, prompt and effective surveillance should continue, he stated. He wanted a good number of positive samples to be sent for genome sequencing to INSACOG Labs in a prompt manner, accelerating the testing to ensure quick identification of cases and effective contact tracing for curbing the spread of the transmission.

PM Modi said that States need to ensure that the eligible population is fully vaccinated against Covid19, and to proceed to meet the target in a saturation mode. The Hindu BusinessLine

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