Trichy: Use soap if sanitizer is not available, says health department

TRICHY: The public health department and preventive medicine and the Trichy district administration have advised the public to wash their hands with soap, instead of sanitizers.
“Branded sanitizers may be out of stock. In fact, there is no compulsion to use only sanitizers. Yet, we have been making sanitizers and supplying them to health centres. Soaps alone are enough to wash the hands if we follow the hand washing techniques,” Trichy district collector S Sivarasu told reporters after addressing an awareness meeting on Covid-19 here on Saturday. The meeting was attended by representatives from hospitals, theatres, marriage halls, schools and other businesses.
On the necessity for mass awareness programme, the collector said, “Rumours about Covid-19 are rife on social media, so, we are supposed to drive home the right message to the people. In the first phase, business people have been sensitized on the preventive measures. Since the source of spreading the virus is hand, we have asked them to make their places virus free.”
School administrations have been asked to create awareness on Covid-19 during the prayer every morning. They have also been told to keep the vans carrying children disinfected by spraying disinfectant. The collector also csaid that there was no need to declare holiday for schools in Trichy.
On the cleanliness in theatres, the collector warned of action if the guidelines on preventive measures were skipped. Theatres have been asked to clean the halls with disinfectants once the show is over. “A nodal officer from the public health department will monitor their measures and will be subjected to action in case of lack of compliance,” collector said.
Endorsing a similar view on the use of sanitizers, deputy director of health services (DDHS), Trichy Dr A Subramani said the basic concept is that everyone should follow hand wash either with soap or sanitizer.
He also said, “All cases are imported from other states due to the travel history to other countries. So far, there is no community spread. The virus spreads through droplets.”
Officials also confirmed that the need for wearing mask was restricted to infected people and those in contact with them.