NAGPUR: To curb spread of Covid-19 infection in city, Nagpur Municipal Corporation (
NMC) on Monday started testing hawkers at their business places using a mobile swab collection centre. The civic body will also start Covid testing of food delivery executives from Tuesday.
Municipal commissioner Radhakrishnan B had on Friday announced Covid
testing of hawkers, vegetable vendors, milkmen, delivery boys, staff of courier services and other such people who daily come in contact with a large number of people.
Accordingly, an NMC team led by assistant medical officer Dr Vijay Joshi took the mobile swab collection centre to Sitabuldi market, which is one of the most crowded areas of the city. The team talked to representatives of the hawkers association and also interacted with hawkers. However, only 14 hawkers turned up and gave swab samples there.
NMC’s additional municipal commissioner Ram Joshi told TOI, “We have already informed the hawkers associations and will also hold meetings at zone-level to convince them for undergoing Covid testing.”
Medical officer Dr Sanjay Chilkar said plan is to begin testing of delivery boys in Laxmi Nagar zone on Tuesday.
The civic body has identified nine localities where the number of cases is higher as of now — Khamla, Swawlambi Nagar, Jaitala, Wathoda, Dighori, Jaripatka, Jafar Nagar, New Bidipeth and Ayodhya Nagar.
Dr Chilkar said, “Rapid Response Team (RRT) was appointed for each area on Friday. Each RRT is inspecting 50 households and inquiring about health, checking temperature and oxygen saturation level of persons with comorbidities and senior citizens. Two more RRTs have been deputed for each area on Monday. Thus, 1,350 households will be covered in a day.”
The NMC also organized special camps by engaging mobile swab collection centres in these areas on Sunday and Monday. Samples of over 500 people were collected in the two days.
Some NGOs and enthusiasts came forward to encourage contacts of Covid positive persons and those with symptoms to undergo testing. With the help of NMC, radiologist Dr Nayeem Khan arranged mobile swab collection centre at Eidgah ground in Jafar Nagar.
The civic chief has also directed owners of shops and hotels to get their all employees tested once in a month and also submit a work plan within 10 days.
Weekly data clearly shows rise in Covid cases in the district, especially in city. In the first week of February, 1,824 cases were registered for a daily average of 261. Also, 27,508 tests were done for a daily average of 3,930.
Cases increased to 2,657 in the second week and daily average was 380. The number of tests also increased to 30,962, which means 4,423 per day.
However, the number of cases detected in the first two weeks of January was more compared to the corresponding period of February. Daily average was 412 in the first week and 413 in the second. Cases declined in the third (285/day) and fourth week (273/day), though no rise in Covid casualties has been reported in the same period.