BENGALURU: With an intention to up the preparedness to deal with COVID-19 which is continuing to spread fear across several countries, the Union Ministry for Health on Saturday held a video conference with Health Secretaries from all States and Union Territories across India. It has decided to train a few selected doctors to detect, test and treat the patients with symptoms of COVID. These trainers will be training several doctors across their respective states.
In a release sent by Joint Secretary of National Health Mission, Lav Agarwal, to Karnataka’s health department, it said, “Surveillance, infection prevention and control and risk communication are critical focus areas identified to prepare our workforce to effectively tackle threat of COVID.” As part of this there will be a National level Training of Trainers and four senior-level officials from all states/UTs will be attending the same which will be held on March 6. The officials include State Surveilance Officers, HoD Microbiologists, senior clinician and IEC officer.
The four will in turn before March 11 should train officials from districts to build a pool of trainers for the districts. Later, at least 30-50 participants should be trained in districts to ensure stopping of spreading of the virus. Meanwhile, Preeti Sudan, Secretary (HFW) chaired a video conference including senior officials of National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) and Airport Public Health Officers (APHOs) to review their preparedness for prevention and management of COVID-19.
According to a release by Secretary (HFW) stated, “with cases found in South Korea, Iran and Italy there is a need for States/UTs to maintain high vigil and be alert with respect to the protocols for community surveillance, and screening at the airports and check-posts. ”Secretary (HFW) also urged them to enhance awareness in the community on the preventive measures and also popularise the state control room numbers.
Meanwhile, WHO is working closely with key institutions of MoHFW such as National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC), the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) and the Ministry of Information & Broadcasting (MoIB) and have been providing continuous technical updates and guidance to assess risk, disease surveillance, laboratory testing capacity and risk communications, needed at national and sub-national levels.