HYDERABAD: It is not just doctors, even other frontline warriors playing a key role in the battle against Covid-19, including sanitation workers and security guards deployed at hospitals, are falling prey to the disease. Six contract workers of King Koti Hospital — three sanitation workers and three security guards — tested positive for the virus. Their families have also undergone tests. Life has become more difficult for many such contract workers, whose financial woes have multiplied because of the lockdown.
One Covid-affected worker, a 30-year-old woman, told Express that her children — aged 17 and 11 years — also tested positive for the virus. “I have had no symptoms. Last Friday, when I got to know that two workers with whom I had come in contact with tested positive, I informed the authorities. When I was tested, the results came positive. I am not scared for myself but for my family - my children, husband, and mother-in-law.
While my husband tested negative, my fears came true when my children tested positive two days ago. The report of my mother-in-law is awaited. Now we would be shifted to Chest Hospital in Erragadda for treatment.” The woman’s husband is an auto driver, and since he could not work due to the lockdown, she became the sole breadwinner of the family with her `8,500 salary, which she gets in-hand.
She said that she was still waiting for the one-time monetary incentive promised to all healthcare workers in recognition of their services by Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrasekar Rao (which will come up to 10 per cent of their salaries for the month of April) which would prove helpful in these testing times for her family.
Contract health workers to stage dharna
The TS Medical Contract Employees Workers Union announced on Sunday that they would stage a one-hour dharna for three days, starting from Monday, in the hospitals they work to demand that they be provided the facility of seven days of work followed by seven days quarantine. In view of the rising number of doctors and other healthcare workers testing positive for Covid-19, the State government recently issued orders that all healthcare workers be divided in two batches.
While one batch would work for seven days, the other batch would go into quarantine for the next seven days to protect the frontline warriors from infection. “As the number of sanitation workers is less, hospitals are not providing the work-quarantine facility to these workers, many of whom also work as patient care staff and security guards,” said union president M Narsimha
Mayor tests negative
Hyderabad Mayor Bonthu Rammohan underwent a Covid-19 test and was reported negative on Sunday. He had allegedly visited the same cafe that a Covid patient had visited a while ago in Ramnagar, and took the test on Sunday
‘COVID BEEP’ to check vital stats of patients
Minister of State for Home Affairs G Kishan Reddy and Minister of State for Prime Minister’s Office Jitendra Singh inaugurated ‘Covid Beep’ - a device developed by ESIC in collaboration with ECIL, Atomic Energy Department, over video-conference on Sunday. The device can measure vital parameters like body temperature, oxygen saturation in the blood, heart rate, respiratory rate, electrocardiogram
and blood pressure, along with patient location