The Greater Chennai Corporation has launched vehicles for each of the 200 wards to transport residents to COVID-19 screening centres.
Corporation Commissioner G. Prakash told journalists on Sunday that each of the sanitary inspectors of the 200 wards would get one 10-seater vehicle to transport residents to 12 screening centres. This is aimed at avoiding delay in transport.
“The city has COVID-19 screening centres at 12 locations. We are planning to increase the number of screening centres. Medical college professors will screen the residents, taking X-ray and a complete blood count, and carry out gradation of the patients before sending them to tertiary care hospitals, COVID-19 health centres or COVID-19 care centres,” Mr. Prakash said.
Many COVID-19-positive residents, who have been asymptomatic, have also been sent to home isolation, monitored by FOCUS volunteers. At least 75% of the positive patients in the city are asymptomatic. Most of them are in home isolation. According to estimates, more than 12,000 positive patients are in home isolation. Around 10% of the patients are in tertiary care hospitals and around 15% in COVID-19 health centres.
Following an increase in the number of positive cases in more than 9,500 streets of the city in the last week of June, the civic body initiated measures to contain the spread of COVID-19. As a result, the number of streets with active cases had come down by 1,100. According to data compiled on July 3, 8,402 of the 39,506 streets in the 15 zones have active cases. Stressing the need for reducing the time taken for screening, Mr. Prakash said the time would be brought down to three hours.
“COVID-19 management is a major activity. In April, we were directed by the Chief Minister to focus on patient management. So, we started five screening centres. Now, the number of screening centres has increased to 12. The Chief Minister has ordered that the screening process be completed in three hours,” Mr. Prakash said.
“As we are relaxing lockdown, we need cooperation from residents. The number of beds in the COVID-19 care centres is 17,500. New care centres will be opened in seven days. Consequently, the number of beds in these centres will increase. Fever camps have been successful, preventing the spread of COVID-19,” he said.
The city had 24,195 active cases on Sunday. At least 41,000 positive patients had recovered. The case mortality rate in the city was 1.55%., Mr. Prakash added.