Bengaluru, May 28: The Karnataka government has done away with previously mandatory COVID-19 testing for asymptomatic international travellers.
The development comes a day after the government issued a circular, which allowed placing of international travellers into home quarantine if they had completed seven days of institutional quarantine.
A circular signed by Jawaid Akhtar, Additional Chief Secretary to the State Government, dated May 27, says that any “person who has completed seven days of institutional quarantine and is asymptomatic can be permitted for home quarantine with a COVID-19 test (RT-PCR), subject to undergoing a medical check-up.”
This check-up equates to thermal screening (with a required temperature of under 37.5C or 99.5F and pulse oximetry of under 94%).
The circular added that all elderly people, over the age of 60, and those with comorbidities (such as Diabetes mellitus, hypertension, asthma, heart ailment, renal disease...etc) are “required to be clinically evaluated diligently prior to shifting them for quarantine.”
On Wednesday, Pankaj Pandey, Commissioner, the Department of Health and Family Welfare said that these new guidelines were based on recommendations from the COVID Task Force. A member of the COVID Task Force said that new strategies had been formulated based on the latest findings on how the SARS-Cov-2 virus affects people.
Bengaluru, May 1: As Mumbai link surfacing in some COVID-19 cases in Mandya district in Karnataka, JDS leader and former chief minister H D Kumaraswamy on Friday blamed the district administration for the situation, accusing it of not quarantining 7,000 labourers who 'returned' from the Maharashtra capital.
"The information we have is that there are about 16,000 labourers from Mandya were working in Mumbai of which 7,000 people reached the district. None of them was quarantined properly," Kumaraswamy told reporters in Bengaluru.
He claimed the district, a stronghold of JDS, was staring at a major spurt in cases due to the careless attitude of the district administration. "Government should initiate action against those who are responsible for the laxity," he said.
However, he did not specify when the 7,000 workers returned to Mandya. When asked about Kumaraswamy's claim, officials said they have to verify it. Of the eight cases reported from Mandya on Friday, three had a travel history to Mumbai, a major COVID-19 hotspot in the country, officials said.
A Health Department official said four of the fresh cases were contacts of a patient who tested positive on April 8 and admitted to a hospital. After weeks of coming in contact with him, the four were confirmed for COVID-19, an official said. The Three people with travel history to Mumbai had, in fact, brought the body of a man who died of a heart attack there on April 24, the official added.
Bengaluru, Jul 31: An ambulance driver was thrashed by the family members of a 75-year-old COVID-19 patient who passed away on his way to the hospital in Bengaluru on Thursday.
The incident happened after the patient died in the ambulance while waiting in front of the MS Ramaiah Hospital in Bengaluru.
The driver was dragged out of the ambulance and chased around by a relative.
His clothes were ripped off and harangue were hurled at him. The relative was seen shouting and blaming the driver for the patient's death.
Speaking to news agency, the driver said that he was unable to explain the sequence of the protocol which was to be followed while getting the patient to the treatment ward.
Karnataka is one of the worst-affected states by the coronavirus pandemic. According to the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, the state has 67,456 active cases as of Friday.
The state government has been struggling to contain the spread of the disease as it has intermittently imposed and eased lockdown measures, especially in the capital Bengaluru.
Comments
We are already facing lot of problems here without food and money.
Add new comment