BHUBANESWAR: The Odisha government on Saturday directed districts to step up testing and keep a close watch on Covid patients in home isolation to prevent the further spread of infection. The CDMOs and authorities of civic bodies have been asked to intensify contact tracing and their testing with a focus on cluster containment.
The decision was taken at a review after the state reported more than 1,000 new cases and two deaths in last one week. With 204 fresh cases in last 24 hours, the active cases soared to 1,295. Only 95 patients recovered during the period. The daily test positivity rate stood at 3.5 per cent.
Health department sources said, Sundargarh, Nabarangpur, Cuttack and Sambalpur have maximum active cases and the number of infections may go up further in coming days. Sundargarh has the highest 355 cases, followed by 272 in Nabarangpur, 151 in Cuttack, 88 in Sambalpur and 79 in Bhubaneswar.
The Health and Family Welfare department has asked districts to make the testing more targeted and ensure that all symptomatic patients coming to hospitals are tested. Sources said two persons, who have succumbed to Covid so far this year, were suffering from comorbidities and had tested positive when the mandatory testing was conducted for ICU admissions. Director of public health Dr Niranjan Mishra said the districts will now intensify contact tracing and conduct tests of people, who have come in contact with Covid patients.
“We have asked them to follow up Covid patients in isolation and provide them medicines. The medical teams will counsel home isolation patients not to move out until they recover. People will also have to be careful and self isolate in case they have symptoms,” he said.
Sources said the cases spread in Nabarangpur after two persons, who had attended a local mela, tested positive. One of them was from Chhattisgarh. In the district, most of the cases are from bordering Raigarh and Umerkote blocks from where people usually frequent to the neighbouring state.
A team of officials led by Dr Mishra will be visiting Nabarangpur, Malkangiri and some other districts from Monday. Health authorities claimed this wave will be short and less severe. Of the 1,295 active cases, only 26 are in hospitals and four in ICU.