A day after a COVID-19 positive case was reported from Rajapalayam on Saturday, Virudhunagar district administration have started house-to-house survey of people with cold, cough, fever and breathing problem in over 40,000 houses in Rajapalayam and surrounding areas on Sunday.
Virudhunagar district Collector R. Kannan said all the residents within a radius of 5 km around the house of the COVID-19 patient are under survey.
Around 100 workers, including a village health nurse, urban health nurse, anganwadi, malaria workers and sanitary workers have been engaged for the survey.
The exercise is likely to be completed by afternoon. The workers have been provided with masks as a precautionary measure.
Adequate stock of masks have been given to them for distributing among people found having cough to further prevent spreading of the virus.
Similarly, sanitary workers from Rajapalayam municipality and neighbouring panchayats have started disinfecting work.
Mr. Kannan said that the officials have narrowed down that the infection caused to the the middle aged man from Rajapalayam was from a few guests who had arrived from Amsterdam and Germany to attend his family function.
The guests had stayed at his house.
A total of 71 persons who were in close contact with the family of the infected person have been kept in home quarantine.
Identification of other contacts was underway.
