Surat: The shine is back on the Diamond City, the second largest city in the state, which had lost its glitter in the haze of rapid spread of Covid-19 cases. However, with the recovery rate improving even as fatality rates are declining steadily, beleaguered Surtis are finally breathing easy.
According to the Surat municipal commissioner, the civic body has taken many interventions to tackle the pandemic in the last few months which helped immensely in improving the situation.
“One of the major interventions is the high number of Covid-19 testing daily in the city. In July, we used to conduct 136 tests per million per day which has now increased to 2,764 per million per day,” said Banchhanidhi Pani, municipal commissioner, adding that Dhanvantari Raths too proved to be game changers.
SMC deployed 105 raths across the city which conducts tests and provide health services to people’s doorstep as well as removed the stigma of Covid from among the masses.
“Moreover, contact tracing of Covid-19 positive patients is also important and we have increased it from eight to 20 per patient. We have also set up Suraksha Kavachh Samitis in all sectors including industry, commercial and residential areas to ensure Covid-19 guidelines are implemented. All these interventions are working in synergy,” Pani told TOI.