The Greater Chennai Corporation will approve 30% more e-pass for entry of persons from other parts of the country, owing to introduction of two additional categories for issuance of e-passes.
At present, the civic body has approved just 33% of the applications for e-pass to visit the city, rejecting more than three lakh applications. The civic body had been issuing e-pass only for three categories — marriage, death and medical emergency.
Corporation Commissioner G. Prakash on Saturday said people who seek e-pass for “work-related” travel to Chennai will get it.
“Anyone who wants to appear for an interview will get e-pass for visiting Chennai. Persons who want to sign a business agreement may apply for an e-pass,” said Mr. Prakash.
Guest workers from other States will be permitted under a different category, with facilities for 14-day quarantine by the employer.
“At least 1.4 lakh guest workers left the city by train free of cost. We spent ₹18 crore to send them home. They have started returning to Chennai. We will approve e-pass for such persons,” said Mr. Prakash.
Positivity rate
Stressing the need for COVID-19 containment activities for at least another three months, Mr. Prakash said the case positivity rate was 8.5% in the city and was expected to fall 6% by the end of August.
“The case fatality rate is 2.12%. Our target is to reduce it to 1.5%. The case doubling rate is 72.2 days. It was 64 days last week. Many zones of north Chennai have registered a case doubling rate of 140 days,” said Mr. Prakash.
The civic body had made arrangements to admit 625 patients with breathlessness without testing for COVID-19, he said.
The Corporation tested 14,000 people on Friday. As many as 1.07 lakh persons have tested positive for COVID-19. A total of 11,606 active cases have been reported. “Most of the COVID-19 care centres are under lock and key. Just 3,300 beds are occupied. We have 17,500 beds in COVID-19 care centres,” said Mr.Prakash.
The number of deaths due to COVID-19 had reduced from 40 to 20 every day. About 16 lakh people had been on quarantine. About 12 lakh people had been taken out of quarantine in the city, he added.