Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday said that localised containment strategies are the need of the hour specially for states where the test positivity rate (TPR) in districts is high.
At a high-level review meeting to discuss the coronavirus situation in the country, the Prime Minister instructed that testing needs to be scaled up further, with use of both RT-PCR and Rapid tests, especially in areas with high test positivity rates.
India witnessed a slight dip in the number of fresh infections with 326,098 infections in the last 24 hours. Deaths from the virus surged by 3,890 to hit 266,207 in total.
Discussed a number of issues during today’s review meeting on COVID-19, including scaling up testing in areas with high TPR, preparing localised containment strategies, augmenting health capacities in rural areas and ramping up the speed of vaccination. https://t.co/ysQmtDiZAQ
— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) May 15, 2021
Modi said states should be encouraged to report their numbers transparently without any pressure of high numbers showing adversely on their efforts.
He asked for augmentation of healthcare resources in rural areas to focus on door to door testing and surveillance.
"The Prime Minister took serious note of some reports about ventilators lying unutilised in storage in some states and directed that an immediate audit of installation and operation of ventilators provided by the Central Government should be carried out," said the prime minister's office in an official statement.
The Prime Minister added that refresher training for properly operating ventilators should be provided to healthcare workers if necessary.
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