Odisha Fights Corona: Bhubaneswar Safe, Asserts Health Secy

Bhubaneswar: The Odisha government on Saturday assured the denizens of Bhubaneswar that the capital city is safe from the novel coronavirus (COVID-19).

“Timely intervention by the government has made the capital city a safe zone due to the prompt contact tracing of the suspected patients and their mandatory quarantine followed by sample test. I can say it in a sentence: Bhubaneswar is safe,” Principal Secretary, Health and Family Welfare, Nikunja Bihari Dhal told mediapersons here in the evening.

He said as Bhubaneswar is identified as one of the hotspots in the country with more than 15 positive cases, the surveillance teams have successfully traced the suspected patients, collected their travel history and a detailed contact list. On the basis of the list, the sample tests of these persons are being done without delay.

Referring to the frequency of sample tests per day, Dhal said Bhubaneswar leads in terms of the number of sample tests done elsewhere in the country.

“Going by the average number of sample tests done on every one lakh people, he said Delhi has 92 samples followed by Mumbai (188). On the other hand, 190 sample tests are done in Bhubaneswar. Despite this, we are going to conduct even more tests,” he added.

Stating that the weeklong rapid sample test in the capital city has begun today, Dhal said the health teams are conducting a door-to-door survey and taking the samples from the people.

“We had collected 788 samples on Friday and 756 today in the first shift survey. The number will increase further after the end of the second shift survey,” he pointed out.

Highlighting the advantage of the rapid test, Dhal said the blood is taken from the vein and the test report is available in 15/20 minutes. In case the rapid test reveals a positive case, the swab of the concerned person is collected for another round of test.

Justifying the contention the efforts of the state government to contain the spread of the virus has paid off, he said not even one per cent of the total beds in the special COVID-19 hospitals set up by the government is yet to be filled.

“Despite this, the state government has made elaborate healthcare arrangements for the safety of the people against the deadly virus,” Dhal said.