215 +ve cases in S Dinajpur, including 26 BSF jawans
BALURGHAT: A record number of 215 Corona positive cases, including 26 BSF jawans, were reported from South Dinajpur on Wednesday, raising the total number of the infected figure to 2,784. On Monday, 145 positive cases were detected in a single day while 1,799 patients were cured and discharged.
Of the 215 cases, 70 hail from Kumarganj, 52 from Balurghat, 21 from Tapan, 20 from Harirampur, 16 from Banshihari, 15 from Kushmandi, 12 from Hili and nine from Gangarampur. Notably, 26 BSF jawans from Basanti Border Outpost in Kumarganj were infected with the deadly virus.
Following this detection, District Magistrate Nikhil Nirmal conducted a high-level meeting with senior administrative and health officials. A senior official said: "The district is conducting more tests/million and is having a higher discharge rate than the rest of the state average. Initially, the testing rate was 500/day (including RT-PCR and Rapid Antigen tests). Now, the figure has gone up to 1000/day."
It has been decided that all blocks will prepare village-wise mapping of blocks showing the status of COVID-19 spread in all villages based on the number of cases recorded in the last 30 days. All the villages will be marked in four colours — Green (zero cases), Yellow (1-5 cases), Orange (6-10 cases) and Red (11 cases and above).
The Swasthya Sathi cell will expedite the claim disbursement process of the Covid warriors who have been infected. As of now, a total of 250 staff from various departments including health, police, municipality and general administration have been infected. 50 claims regarding the matter have already been disbursed. Rest will be expedited shortly.
Psychiatric screening of all patients staying in 'Safe Homes' and Covid hospitals will be done. Fire audit will be completed for all the 'Safe Homes' and hospitals soon and fire-extinguishers will be made available for emergencies.
Police and 10 civic volunteers who were tested COVID-19 positive and now discharged from hospital after being cured will be engaged as guards in 'Safe Homes'.
On August 17, a subdivision level workshop was conducted for the Covid warriors. They were counselled and appraised for possible positive engagement to help the administration battle the pandemic in the district.
