With the number of COVID-19 positive cases crossing the 2,000-mark on Saturday, and new positive cases getting reported at the rate of 100 to 200 per day for the past four days, the district administration has drawn plans to convert a warehousing godown into 1,500-bed COVID Care Centre at Raminepalli, about 14 km from the Government General Hospital in Anantapur.
The district, which was at the bottom of the list of COVID-19 positive districts in the State, has come to the second position with 2,099 cases with Anantapur origin and another 300 cases with origin from other States and countries.
Kurnool district has 2,354 cumulative positive cases of district origin and another 350 with other State/country origin. While Anantapur district has 951 active cases being treated in four hospitals and five COVID Care Centres, Kurnool has 1,131 active cases being treated in four hospitals and about nine COVID Care centres as on Saturday.
District Collector Gandham Chandrudu on Saturday inspected the newly constructed godowns, which could be converted into at least 1,000-bed Covid Care Centre initially, where asymptomatic or patients with mild symptoms could be treated.
The Collector told The Hindu that there were 900 hospital beds available in the district and of them, 500 were still vacant and out of 10 COVID care centres readied, only five were being used, hence the preparation for any possible community transmission and explosion of number of cases, was not a worrying factor. The COVID Care Centres have 2,000 bed capacity.
Meanwhile, there were complaints of the State government itself creating stigma against the COVID-19 patients, while asking people to destigmatise the disease. “We have barricades and police personnel posted on both ends of our colony no allowing anyone to go out or come in at a time when there is no institutional support to deliver essentials like it used to be in April,” said Sayed Vali of Munna Nagar.
‘Dichotomy’
The district administration on the one hand is suggesting home isolation for the COVID positive patients with mild symptoms, but is barricading the lane not allowing anyone close to that place, unlike the practice in other States of declaring just that house as a containment zone and there exists a dichotomy in their practice pointed out Communist Party of India (Marxist) district secretary V. Rambhupal.
The district administration had set up a Triage Centre on SK University campus and three teams of doctors scan a suspect/confirmed patient and conduct Triage to determine if a patient needs to be taken to a hospital, COVID Care Centre or allowed to be home isolated during treatment. All of them are provided support and monitored by three call centres at control rooms set up separately for the three kinds of patients, Mr. Chandrudu explained.
