CHENNAI: While it is usual for Corporation staff to quarantine those in the neighbourhood of a person tested positive for the Coronavirus, they were in a bizarre situation on Tuesday, left to ‘home’ quarantine a group of homeless families.
After a 50-year-old woman tested positive on Monday, it was found that there were a group of around 30 homeless individuals staying in the same street as hers (the street name has been withheld to protect the woman’s privacy).
Having ruled out the option to shift them, Corporation staff have asked for both ends of the street to be barricaded, thus placing them under ‘street’ quarantine. Entry and exit of vehicles have been stopped on the stretch.
Since Tuesday was their first day of the quarantine, the families said they had access to food. Corporation officials told The New Indian Express that they would be provided with food for their quarantine period even if they run out of stock.
What doesn't seem to have crossed their mind, however, was their need to access a toilet. This does not give them a chance to use the toilet whenever they need to, let alone washing their hands from time to time.
While there is a public toilet nearby, it has been defunct and the families had been using the one at Stringer’s street and other nearby toilets. With their street closed off now, no arrangements have been made so far for the toilets.
For now, they are being allowed out of the streets to use the public toilet in other streets. However, this may pose a safety concern for others using the same facilities.
“If we tell the police, they let us go through the barricade to use the toilet in nearby streets,” said one of the residents of the street. This person who requested anonymity has been staying here for the past 32 years.
Physical distancing norms thrown to the wind
As of noon on Tuesday, the families said that they have not been provided with masks or any kind of sanitary kits, considering their risk of exposure, without homes, may be higher.
“We don’t have the money to buy masks and even if we did, we are quarantined now and we can’t go. We are completely dependent on them (authorities),” said Malavathi (name changed), a 28-year-old resident.
Although police and other corporation staff have been asking people there to maintain distance between them, the families said it was not practically possible.
“If some people cook here and the rest of us eat so we can’t maintain distance here as they ask. Also, they keep asking us to go back inside whenever they see us. What do they mean by inside? We live on the street,” she said.
When asked, Corporation officials said that arrangements will be made for temporary toilets to be made accessible to them. “We will ensure that there will be no issues for them to use the toilet,” the official said.
Meanwhile, corporation officials said that they were in the process of ‘sectoring’ the area after which a detailed survey of 10,000-12,000 people will be done in the neighbourhood.
“From the house which has been quarantined, 500 houses around it are considered to be in the Central sector where we have to be very careful in order to contain the spread. This set of homeless individuals falls under the Central sector which is why we had to immediately quarantine them,” the official said.
“So far, they are all healthy and safe and are not showing any symptoms,” he further added.