CHANDIGARH: Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar on Wednesday said that taking cognisance of the recent surge in coronavirus cases, the state has already ramped up its COVID-19 management preparations.
This includes aggressive surveillance, stringent containment, swift contact tracing, focused clinical management along with proactive Information Education and Communication (IEC) activities, he said.
The chief minister said that the state has already launched a mega vaccination drive across Haryana.
"So far, 7.50 lakh people have been vaccinated and on Monday, a record 1.59 lakh people were vaccinated in a single day in Haryana. The state has planned to launch such mega drives on every Monday and Tuesday to ensure that every beneficiary receives vaccination doses", Khattar said during a virtual interaction, which Prime Minister Narendra Modi had with state chief ministers over the pandemic situation and the ongoing vaccination drive.
Deputy Chief Minister Dushyant Chautala and state Health Minister Anil Vij were also present in the meeting, an official statement said.
Khattar informed that under the mega vaccination campaign launched across the state, so far, 80 per cent of healthcare workers and 67 per cent of frontline workers have been vaccinated.
Also, 3.5 lakh people above the age of 60 years and people in the age group of 45 to 60 having comorbidities have been vaccinated.
He said last Tuesday 65,000 people were vaccinated under the 'Mega Tuesday' drive.
Besides this, the vaccination drive would also be carried out in the rest of the days too.
Divulging details about the steps taken by the Haryana government for containment of COVID-19 spread, Khattar said that more emphasis has been laid on the meticulous implementation of COVID-19 appropriate behaviour.
The chief minister informed that in a bid to once again encourage people to follow COVID-19 appropriate behaviour, a drive of imposing a fine on those who are found without masks is being run.
"Apart from this, various awareness campaigns regarding COVID-19 guidelines like wearing masks, sanitising hands and social distancing are being launched across the state along with enforcement of COVID-19 precautions and guidelines at public places like malls, eating joints, bus stands, schools, colleges," he said.
Sharing the clinical management strategy adopted by Haryana, Khattar said that the daily testing rate is also to be increased to 25,000 to 30,000 tests per day as it was being done before.
He said that the state's RTPCR rate is about 93 per cent.
He informed that Haryana's performance in several parameters as set by the central government is better than the national average and the state would further leave no stone unturned to implement the required parameters to contain COVID-19.
Notably, in the recent days, coronavirus cases, which had fallen under 100 over a month ago, have once again started to increase.
The chief minister further informed that the cluster approach for vaccination is being adopted to ensure that vaccination of every beneficiary is done.
He said that as schools have been reopened, therefore, extensive screening and testing of every student is being done in every district.
Khattar informed that an appeal has also been made to the people of the state to wear masks whenever they venture out.
Besides this, eligible beneficiaries in the state have been urged to get themselves vaccinated from both the government and private hospitals empanelled with the government.
"Though vaccination for COVID-19 has been rolled out, we all should religiously follow all the guidelines like wearing masks and maintaining social distancing to stay safe and to ensure containment of the virus spread," said the chief minister.