Even as the 76-year old man who died on Tuesday night tested positive for COVID-19 late on Thursday night, Kalaburagi district was put on high alert.
As the lab report reached the district headquarters, Deputy Commissioner B. Sharat held an emergency meeting of top officials from different departments and discussed the precautionary measures to be taken to prevent spread of the disease.
As day broke on Friday, the district administration swung into action and began shifting all the 31 people who had been in direct contact with the elderly man, before and after his death, to the special quarantine ward established at the State-run ESIC medical complex. They are considered high-risk patients and each one of them has been provided one medical officer. Four medical professionals who had treated the patient before his death at a private hospital in the city are also among the high-risk suspects.
Fifteen more people who had been in contact with the dead man in one way or the other and were considered ‘low-risk’ patients have been quarantined.
Throat swabs and blood samples of four high-risk patients who developed some COVID-19 symptoms — one developed cold and the other three cough — were collected and dispatched to the National Institute of Virology in Bengaluru in a special vehicle.
Ward No. 30 in Kalaburagi Municipal Corporation area, where the COVID-19-infected patient lived, was declared a containment area for intense monitoring. Mr. Sharat also alerted the Telangana administration as the patient had visited Hyderabad for treatment.
Annual jatra
Soon after the midnight meeting with officials, Mr. Sharat called on Sharanabasavappa Appa, the head of Sharana Basaveshwara Samstan, and appealed to him to cancel the Sharana Basaveshwara Jatra, an annual carnival, that was scheduled to begin on Friday. The latter agreed to celebrate the Jatra only with his family members to avoid the huge mass gathering that the Jatra would attract every year.
Since the message did not reach all the people owing to paucity of time, thousands arrived for the event on Friday morning. Police and Health Department teams were deployed to convince them to go back. Teams were also deployed at all taluk borders to prevent people from coming to Kalaburagi for the jatra.
Mr. Sharat, along with other officers, addressed an emergency press conference to explain the precautionary measures in place.
Exercising powers conferred under Section 133 of the Criminal Procedure Code, the DC has declared a holiday for all anganwadis, schools, colleges and other educational institutions, except those conducting examinations, for a week. He has also ordered the closure of multiplexes, cinema halls, shopping malls and public gardens, as well as the cancellation of all government functions that will attract a crowd. He has also ordered postponement of all religious carnivals across the district.
