For the first time in 45 days, the Guntur district has not recorded any new COVID-19 positive case, giving an indication that the district administration has finally managed to have a grip on the spread of this viral infection at least in the first phase.
An intense campaign and a somewhat harsh containment strategy seemed to have paid off, as no new case has been reported in the last 24 hours. District Collector I. Samuel Ananda Kumar led from the front, putting in place 16 surveillance teams that handled the cluster containment strategies.
The total number of cases stands at 404 and 257 of them have been discharged.
“Our battle against COVID-19 began with merely following the World Health Organisation’s protocol of identifying, isolating, testing and treating the affected persons. The entire district administration was focussed on this single aspect for more than 45 days, and we spent sleepless days. But thanks to constant guidance from the Chief Minister, we are able to contain the spread in the district. Now, our focus is on those who have returned from the Koyambedu market in Chennai,’’ said Mr. Kumar.
Suspects tested
The district administration has identified 105 Delhi returnees, 1,981 primary contacts and 2,154 secondary contacts. Of them, 22 Delhi returnees, 253 primary and 88 secondary contacts tested positive.
More than 600 persons above 60 years and having co-morbid conditions have been tested but none was positive.
Testing has too been ramped up in the district. With more than 15,000 samples being tested, the rate of testing has gone up to 2,758 tests per million. The district has three RT-PCR testing machines, four TrueNAT labs and many rapid testing kits.
