BHUBANESWAR: Instead of introducing any new curb, chief minister
Naveen Patnaik on Tuesday directed police to begin a 10-day drive to strictly implement existing Covid norms across the state to contain the virus spread.
Naveen also sought greater preparedness in hospitals and massive public awareness to tackle the second wave of infections.
Chairing a
review meeting on the pandemic situation in a videoconference with top officers and district collectors, the CM asked DGP Abhay to deploy enough police personnel to effectively enforce Covid norms such as of wearing masks, maintaining social distancing and take action against people violating curfew during the special drive at the earliest. Police sources said the drive with zero tolerance against violations will begin from Wednesday.
Notably, the government has implemented night curfew in 10
western Odisha districts between 10 pm and 5 am from Monday. “We have to enforce the Covid safety protocols strictly to slow down the spread of the virus. DGP to deploy the police personnel in large numbers across the state in a 10-day drive to strictly enforce the Covid Safety protocols as notified,” Naveen was quoted by a government statement as saying in the meeting.
Observing that the virus spread seems to be mainly concentrated in districts adjoining Chhattisgarh border, Naveen asked chief secretary Suresh Chandra Mohapatra and additional chief secretary (health) Pradipta Mohapatra to visit western Odisha districts with high incidence of the Covid positive cases and make an on the ground assessment and take suitable urgent action.
The CM told the
health department to immediately redeploy doctors, paramedics and laboratory technicians to western Odisha districts to strengthen the manpower required to fight the virus. He also directed the health department to ensure enough hospital capacity to take care of the rising infections.
Naveen directed the health department to deploy sufficient ambulances with oxygen supply in the highly affected areas and properly monitor the patients to ensure that any emergency call is addressed timely, with a sense of urgency and sensitivity. “There should be no complaints about non-responsiveness of ambulances or lack of beds in the hospitals,” he said.
The chief minister advised the information and public relations department to start a new awareness campaign to sensitise the citizens to follow norms of face mask, hand hygiene and social distancing. He told the collectors to involve all sections of the society including the panchayati raj members and
Mission Shakti groups and ensure awareness and enforcement.
Stating that the new wave of Covid virus spread seems to be more infectious and might create a devastating situation, if not taken seriously, the CM said, “We have to reactivate all our protocols and make the entire machinery work with enthusiasm and vigour.:
“We will go for strict enforcement of covid norms at institutional and Individual level,” he said appealing people to be alert and follow the norms and please cooperate with the enforcement machinery.
Naveen said Odisha was witnessing an increasing trend in the virus spread in recent weeks, as in other parts of the country and the world, and said, “There is no place for complacency as valuable lives are at stake.”.
“We have been able to successfully control the first wave of Covid in spite of a challenging situation when the nature of the virus was unknown. We are now battle hardened and I am sure we will be able to successfully tackle this resurgence of the virus infection,” he said.