BHUBANESWAR: Odisha Speaker S N Patro Thursday said that RT-PCR negative report is mandatory for all, including lawmakers for entering the Assembly which commences its monsoon session from September 1.
Apart from MLAs, RT-PCR tests will also be held for all the Assembly employees and its ministerial staff, as per a decision taken at a meeting chaired by Patro during the day.
He said the legislators, their drivers and personal staff, and employees of the House will go for the RT-PCR test from 8.30 AM to 1.30 PM and 3 PM to 5 PM on August 29, 30 and 31 in the Assembly premises.
MLAs and employees of the Assembly who test negative will be allowed to enter the Assembly, he said.
Legislators, their personal staff and the Assembly secretariat employees who did not receive even a single dose of the vaccine will not be permitted to enter the House, official sources said.
The MLAs will be provided with face masks, sanitiser and gloves daily during the monsoon session, the sources added.
Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC) has been given the task to sanitise the Assembly premises.
The monsoon session will be held from September 1 to September 9, he said.
The state's COVID-19 tally rose to 9,98,187 on Thursday as 1,041 more people, including 128 children and adolescents, tested positive for the infection, while 68 fresh fatalities pushed the state's coronavirus death toll to 7,154, a health official said.
Though the daily count had remained below 1,000 for three consecutive days from Monday, it rose to 1,041 in the last 24 hours.
The daily test positivity rate (TPR) also witnessed an increase to 1.57 per cent from 1.43 per cent on Wednesday, the official said.
As many as 605 new cases came from quarantine centres while the remaining 436 fresh infections were detected during contact tracing.
Khurda district, under which Bhubaneswar falls, recorded the highest number of new cases at 398, followed by Cuttack (176).
Cuttack registered the highest number of fresh fatalities at 18, followed by Jagatsinghpur (10), Khurda (seven), Dhenkanal (six), Bhadrak and Mayurbhanj (five each), Angul (four), Balasore, Jajpur, and Kendrapara (three each), Ganjam (two), Nayagarh and Sundergarh (one each).
Fifty-three coronavirus patients have died due to comorbidities to date, the official said.
The state now has 9,664 active cases, while 9,81,316 people have recovered from the disease thus far, including 845 on Wednesday.
The coastal state has tested over 1.72 crore samples for COVID-19 so far, including 66,281 on Wednesday and the cumulative positivity rate stands at 5.77 per cent, he said.
Odisha has so far inoculated 2,01,03,544 people, of whom 46,76,107 have received both doses.
Meanwhile, around 12 per cent of the new cases reported among children and adolescents in the age group of 0 to 18 years have emerged as a cause of concern for the administration.
As many as 604 people in the age group of 0-18 years have tested positive for COVID-19 in the past five days in the state and experts believe that the infection among children and adolescents may increase in coming days due to a possible third wave of the pandemic.
Since August 15, out of the 4,680 people who tested positive for Coronavirus in Odisha, 604 cases were found among children and adolescents.
Director of Health Service (DHS) Bijay Mohapatra said the state has made adequate arrangements for the treatment of COVID-19 affected children.