Goa Chief Minister Pramod Sawant on Monday announced that the state government will conduct a door-to-door survey across the state in which enumerators will go to people and check whether they are experiencing symptoms similar to that of COVID-19 and their travel history.

Officials said a similar survey had been conducted in one district of Rajasthan. They added that the need for such a survey was felt as six out of seven COVID-19 patients had a foreign travel history. Goa has seven COVID-19 cases so far.

The survey will be conducted between April 13 and 15 and the data will be processed thereafter.

“We are executing this huge community exercise to collect information on everyone through our health staff, government and aided school teachers will fan out across the state in pairs with a preset questionnaire that families across the state will be expected to fill,” he added.

“This will also include labour colonies, and clusters across industrial belts and tenants across the state…. This is a decision taken by the state government as this will also help us understand aspects of community transmission….”

The Chief Minister also announced a 20 per cent hike in wages for frontline health staff and workers at ESI Hospital which is treating COVID-19 cases.