Plan ready to ease curbs in districts with low cases, says Maharashtra health minister Rajesh Tope

PUNE: State health minister Rajesh Tope said on Tuesday that a new strategy for easing restrictions is being prepared for districts with lower than 1% weekly Covid positivity rate (WPR) or lesser than the state’s average (4.5% this week).
The proposal will be submitted this week for final approvals from the chief minister, he said.
Except for districts with high weekly positivity rates, the rest will be permitted to relax restrictions, allowing businesses and movement for extended hours.

Currently, almost all districts and regions are under level-3 restrictions. In Pune, for example, malls and multiplexes remain shut. Restaurants, bars and food courts are not allowed to have customers over on weekends.
“The chief minister had directed the public health department to ready the proposal. We’ll be submitting it this week and the final approval will come from the chief minister,” Tope said.
Full vaccination coverage will also be a key criteria for relaxed curbs across sectors, the minister said, adding that there are nearly 13 to 14 districts (from a total of 35) that have been recording a WPR of 0.1%-0.9%. These districts definitely need some relaxations for economic revival, Tope said.
He said there are also districts that have been recording (for at least three weeks) a WPR of above 1%, but lower than the state average. These districts may be placed in a separate category. Districts with higher WPRs may also be considered for separate categories of relaxations, he said.
Tope said, “We have submitted the broad outline and based on local conditions, districts can take a call after assessing their WPR. This [proposal] has been readied with the help of the state task force. However, all care will be taken to ensure that even as relaxations are given, there are no violations of Covid protocols.”
On Monday, Maharashtra became the first state in the country to fully vaccinate over one crore people against Covid-19.
As on Monday, the state had given two doses to a whopping 1,00,99,524 people while 2.15 crore had received their first jab.
Tope said the proposal to ease restrictions also includes this factor.
Several sectors of the industry had put up proposals for relaxed curbs, with some suggesting the return of staff to bio-bubbles. Experts too had said that some key sectors — like manufacturing and hospitality — should be allowed to reopen with the right mix of rules, restrictions and vaccination coverage.
State task force members said that while the public health department is working on preparedness, vaccination coverage should be made a major component ahead of de-escalation of restrictions. Good vaccine coverage can help district administrations make decisions that can boost economic activity, task force members had said.
Head of state task force Dr Sanjay Oak has also reiterated that de-escalation should be a graded, gradual and closely monitored exercise.
Dr Oak said two key components of bio-bubbles are full vaccination and 100% adherence to Covid-appropriate behaviour and masking.