Ghaziabad: In the last 14 days, the Ghaziabad has reported 93 new
cases of Covid-19 — a dip from weeks before that. However, there has been no significant change in the positivity
rate in the district.
In the wake of the rising number of cases in some states, instructions have been given to increase daily
testing in the district by at least 25%. On average, 2,040
Covid tests are being conducted every day at present.
Moreover, the health department has been asked to focus more on surveillance and contact tracing.
“Even though the Covid numbers are minuscule in Ghaziabad, the threat of a surge in cases cannot be ignored. An instruction to trace at least 26-27 contacts of Covid patients has been given. Also, surveillance teams have been asked to include houses near the patient’s home,” a senior health official said.
The state government is yet to issue any formal guidelines on the matter, but district authorities have been asked internally to put up an enhanced surveillance system to monitor people coming from other states, especially Maharashtra, Kerala and Madhya Pradesh.
This month, nearly 43,761 people have been tested for Covid (till February 21) and 138 persons have been found positive for the virus. The sample
positivity rate is 0.34%, while it was 0.74% in January.
According to official figures, the average contacts traced per patient in the past 14 days is 26.3, while the overall figure (March 2020 to February 2021) is 18.5 per Covid patient.
Abhishek Kulshrestha, WHO surveillance medical officer, said, “There has been no clear-cut rise in UP so far. But the situation may change in the coming days. An upward trend is being witnessed in Covid cases and authorities need to be on high alert.”
With activities resuming in the district, the government had ordered 14-day focussed testing of high-risk groups (street vendors, employees working in hotels, restaurants, sweet shops, jails, privates office and schools and slum dwellers among others) across the state from February 10.
According to the government order, each district was required to spare 50% of the daily antigen tests target and 40% of the daily RT-PCR target for collecting samples from the focussed group.
However, no significant number of cases have been recorded from these groups.