Partial Covid-19 curfew to continue in Andhra Pradesh till May 31
VIJAYAWADA: The Andhra Pradesh government has extended partial curfew till the end of this month to contain the spread of Covid-19. A decision to this effect was taken by Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy at a high-level review meeting on Covid on Monday. He felt that the curfew should be enforced in the State for at least four weeks to get desired results in combating Covid spread. The 14-day curfew imposed in the State on May 5, was scheduled to end on Tuesday. The guidelines will be the same for the extended curfew and the timings are 12 pm to 6 am, he said.
Later in the day, the government issued an order extending the partial curfew till May 31 and it exempted MLAs, MLCs and officials and staff of the State Legislative Assembly and Council from it. They are allowed to attend the Assembly session, which is scheduled to commence on May 20 strictly adhering to Covid protocol.
The Chief Minister directed officials to deposit `10 lakh in the name of each child, whose parents fell victim to Covid, which ensures social security for orphaned children. The beneficiaries can use the deposit after they attained the age of 25 years. Till then the monthly interest accrued on the deposit will be enough to meet the basic needs of beneficiaries. The government will soon issue an order to implement the programme.
On being informed that nine cases of black fungus have been detected in the State so far, he instructed the Health Department to include it in the list of diseases under the YSR Aarogyasri Scheme and notify the network hospitals to treat mucormycosis cases.
However, no deaths due to black fungus have been reported in the State so far. A protocol is set to be evolved to detect black fungus at an early stage and provide treatment to the affected under Aarogyasri. All the District Medical and Health Officers have been instructed to closely monitor the situation with regard to black fungus.
The State government has already placed orders for 1,600 vials of injection to treat black fungus. The allocation of vials to the State is decided by the Centre like in the case of oxygen, Covid vaccine and Remdesivir injection. All the private hospitals have been asked to report black fungus cases to the government soon after the admission of the infected persons.
Jagan said the officials should focus on combating Covid in rural areas effectively. The services of village volunteers, secretariat staff and Asha workers can be utilised to curb the spread of Covid in villages. Covid tests should be conducted on people identified with symptoms of virus during the fever survey and better medicare should be provided to them if they test positive. Emphasis should also be laid on developing infrastructure facilities in Covid Care Centres, he said.
25,539 patients getting treatment under Aarogyasri, say officials
The officials informed the Chief Minister that there are 47,825 beds in 625 Covid hospitals in the State and of the total 38,492 beds are occupied and 25,539 patients are being treated under Aarogyasri. There are also 6,576 ICU beds, 23,463 non-ICU oxygen beds, 17,246 non-ICU non- oxygen beds and 3,467 ventilators in Covid hospitals. In all, 17,417 of the total 52,471 beds in 115 Covid Care Centres in the State have been occupied, they said.
With regard to oxygen supply, the officials said 590 MT of O2 is allocated to AP against its total requirement of 610 MT. The Centre was urged to run an Oxygen Express daily with a capacity of 80 MT from the Reliance plant in Jamnagar to AP. The Karnataka government was urged to supply 130 MT of oxygen from Bellary. Eight ISO containers have reached the State and two more are expected to come soon.
On stock position of protective gear, they informed the Chief Minister that 7,32,542 N-95 masks, 7,55,395 PPE kits, 44,11,353 surgical masks and 23,383 Remdesivir injections are available in the State. Orders were placed to get 8 lakh injections from Mylan and 50,000 from Reddy’s Laboratories, they said.
A total of 65,99,960 vaccine doses have been received from the Centre so far and of the total 62,60,400 doses are of Covishield and 3,39,560 of Covaxin. AP has been allocated 6,90,360 more doses of Covishield vaccine, while the State has procured 8,90,360 doses. Only 1,25,000 doses of Covaxin have been supplied to the State against the allocation of 2,27,490 doses, the officials informed the Chief Minister, while apprising him of the progress of vaccination in the State.
Deputy Chief Minister Alla Kali Krishna Srinivas, Chief Secretary Aditya Nath Das, DGP Gautam Sawang, Covid Command and Control Centre Chairman KS Jawahar Reddy, Principal Health Secretary Anil Kumar Singhal, Covid Task Force Committee Chairman MT Krishna Babu, Secretary (Covid Management and Vaccination) M Ravi Chandra, 104 Call Centre Incharge A Babu, Aarogyasri CEO A Mallikarjuna, APMSIDC Vice-Chairman and Managing Director V Vijayarama Raju, Health Commissioner Katamaneni Bhaskar and other senior officials attended the review meeting.