courtesy  HT OCT 23

Covid cases in district may surge due to festive rush, warn health officials

Devotees sanitise their hands before entering Sheetla Mata Mandir. Health officials said the number of daily new cases have again started showing an uptick in Gurugram. parveen kumar/ ht

Archana Mishra

archana.mishra@hindustantimes.com

Gurugram : The trajectory of Covid-19 cases in the city is likely to go upwards in the next few days, said district health department officials, citing reasons like rush in market and public places due to festive season and the prevalence of other Influenza like illness, like H1N1, due to changing weather conditions.

Health department officials said they were now focusing on increasing the number of tests in rural areas of the district and bring them at par with urban areas to arrest the spread of Covid-19 in the coming weeks.

The department officials said that the number of daily new cases have again started showing an uptick, after having reached a plateau earlier this month. For the second day in a row, more than 300 new Covid-19 cases were reported on Thursday. On Thursday, 324 new cases were reported, up from Wednesday’s 304. It is almost after a month that the number of daily cases have shot up above 300.

Data available with the district administration shows that the daily positivity rate of cases is fluctuating between 10%-11%, while the average positivity rate is around eight percent. Until the first week of October, the test positivity rate was seven percent. “In June, the test positivity rate of the district was 18%. Although the daily numbers can increase, the target is not to let positivity rate get as high as it was in June this year,” said Dr Virender Yadav, chief medical officer.

Going by the strategy — “test, track and treat” — Yadav said that to test and track people who are not coming forward, the department has been holding camps in areas which had not been covered earlier. “It mostly includes rural areas,” said Yadav, explaining that it is likely that people from rural pockets will come out in large numbers during the festive season.

“In urban areas, people are coming for walk-in tests, with some of them even getting tested twice or thrice. Now, we are targeting rural areas like Bhora Kalan, Kasan and rural pockets where camps were not organised frequently,” said Yadav.

Dr MP Singh, nodal officer for camps and containment zones, health department, said that earlier 70% tests were being conducted in urban areas and 30% in rural areas. “From October 19, we have been doing almost an equal number of tests in urban and rural zones,” Singh said.

Health officials said that these camps will be helpful for people who are developing flu like illness due to changing weather and rising air pollution. “Already there is an increase in the footfall of patients in government hospitals reporting respiratory illness due to poor air quality. Therefore, evening camps are being conducted for people who cannot visit hospitals during day time due to office hours. They can easily get themselves tested in these camps,” said Yadav, adding that two testing vans had been deployed for the purpose.

According to him, from November till February is crucial time for H1N1 infection, where patients have almost similar symptoms like Covid-19. Yadav said that the department has been working on a plan to start screening and testing of H1N1 to prevent burden on the existing health infrastructure.

Currently, in Gurugram the total count of people infected with SARS-CoV-2 virus has touched 26,500