The Odisha government on Saturday extended the home quarantine period from 14 days to 28 days for people returning to the State’s urban areas from other States and overseas.
Those having separate rooms and bath room/toilet can stay in home quarantine and a standard operating procedure for monitoring those in home quarantine in urban areas has been issued, the government said.
Along with the returnee, family members would also have to be in quarantine for the specified period. A quarantine sticker would be pasted at the entrance to the house and the neighbours would also be intimated accordingly.
The government further said that neighbours would need to inform the local ward officer or the police if the person concerned failed to adhere to the quarantine protocol. Surveillance teams would keep a close watch on the quarantined family.
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In case the quarantined family was facing difficulties in accessing supplies of essentials, the neighbours would need to assist them, and the quarantined family could also obtain essentials through online orders.
For those returning to rural areas of the State, quarantine facilities have been set up at 15,043 temporary medical centres/camps in 6,798 gram panchayats across the State.
A total of 1,33,245 Odia people had returned from other States by Saturday, the government said.
65 new cases
Meanwhile, 65 new COVID-19 positive cases were detected in different districts taking the State’s total to 737 on Saturday. With this, the number of active cases in the State increased to 538, while the number of persons recovered also increased to 196 with 30 patients getting discharged during the day. So far. three persons have succumbed to the disease in the State.
Of the 65 new positives, 31 were detected in Jajpur district, 13 in Ganjam, six in Cuttack, four each in Puri and Kendrapara, three in Khordha and two each in Mayurbhanj and Nayagarh districts.
Sixty-two of the 65 new cases were detected in quarantine facilities set up for the returnees, while one with travel history and two contacts were in home quarantine.
A majority of returnees found positive on Saturday had returned from Gujarat and West Bengal, barring one who had returned from Jharkhand, the government said.
