NEW DELHI, Aug 8 - The Kamrup Metro district has been identified among 13 districts in eight States reporting high caseload and higher Case Fatality Rate (CFR) than the national average.
Union Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan has chaired two rounds of meetings that concluded here today to engage with the States in order to advise and support them on efforts to prevent and reduce mortality due to COVID-19. Principal Secretary (Health) and MD (NHM) from the eight States along with district surveillance officers, district collectors, commissioners of the municipal corporation, Chief Medical Officers, and Medical Superintendents of Medical Colleges participated in the virtual meeting, said sources.
Official sources said that coordinated, graded and pro-active management of COVID-19 by the Union and State governments has ensured the national CFR is on the slide. It currently stands at 2.04 per cent.
Today�s meeting focused on 13 districts concentrated in eight States, including Kamrup Metro in Assam; Patna in Bihar; Ranchi in Jharkhand; Alappuzha and Thiruvananthapuram in Kerala; Ganjam in Odisha; Lucknow in Uttar Pradesh; 24 Parganas North, Hooghly, Howrah, Kolkata and Maldah in West Bengal; and Delhi.
These districts account for nearly 9 per cent of India�s active cases and about 14 per cent of COVID deaths. They also report low tests per million and high confirmation percentage. A surge has been observed in the daily new cases in four districts, including Kamrup Metro.
Several issues critical to reducing case fatality rate were discussed in the meeting. The States were advised to address the issues of low lab utilization, i.e., less than 100 tests per day for RT-PCR and 10 for others; low tests per million population; decrease in absolute tests from last week; delay in test results; and high confirmation percentage among the health care workers.
The States were advised to ensure timely referral and hospitalization in view of reports from some districts of patients dying within 48 hours of admission. States were directed to ensure unavailability of ambulances with zero tolerance for refusal. States were asked to ensure timely assessment and make advance preparedness for infrastructure, including ICU beds, oxygen supply based on the prevailing case load and the estimated growth rate.
The States were advised to follow all ministry protocols for effective management of containment and buffer zones along with seamless patient and clinical management of patients with special focus on critical cases. Another major area highlighted was that of preventable deaths by strict surveillance among high-risk population like people with co-morbidities, pregnant women, the elderly and children, said sources.
