Will deploy more staff for door-to-door survey: Min

Coimbatore: Food and civil supplies minister R Sakkarapani on Saturday said the number of corporation staff members to carry out the door-to-door survey to identify the people with Covid-19 symptoms would be increased to 3,000-4,000 in another two days from the current 2,400.
He was speaking to reporters after inspecting the Covid control room at the city corporation’s main office at Town Hall along with forest minister K Ramachandran.
The minister said the city corporation was collecting about 5,000 samples daily from its limits for Covid-19 testing. The city corporation limits, where about 18 lakh people reside, daily see a caseload of 1,500 to 1,800 on an average.
He said the civic body had been taking all the necessary steps to contain the virus spread. “It has been regularly conducting door-to-door survey to identify the people with Covid-19 symptoms. There are 7,500 streets and five lakh houses in the corporation limits and the survey teams have already covered 1,244 streets and 1.21 lakh houses so far.”
Sakkarapani said there were 524 containment zones in the corporation limits and they were being disinfected with 43 vehicles. “The corporation had distributed 2,938 medical kits on Friday alone and deployed an official and a volunteer for every containment zone to address the needs of people there.”
Pointing out that the number of cases had come down by 800 in the district on Friday, the minister expressed hope that the caseload would continue to drop. “Public should not step out of their houses unnecessarily. To distribute vegetables and fruits at their doorsteps, the city corporation has granted permission to 2,537 vehicles. At least 1,645 private vehicles, 70 corporation vehicles and 200 agriculture department vehicles are together selling 180 metric tonnes of vegetables a day.”
Sakkarapani said chief minister M K Stalin would visit the district on Sunday and conduct a review meeting with officials. “He will also flag off 10 vehicles per zone to transport patients to hospitals from their houses.”