Deputy Commissioner of Dharwad Nitesh Patil has asked all private healthcare providers in the district to provide data on all frontline health staff by Wednesday to facilitate compilation of data on COVID warriors.
Chairing an awareness programme on guidelines for data collection of health staff for the administrative officers of private hospitals in Dharwad on Monday, Mr. Patil said that all global agencies, including World Health Organisation, were in the process of data collection on COVID warriors.
It had been decided that COVID-19 vaccine would be given to frontline health staff to begin with, once it was launched and that is why providing information on the health staff was important, he said.
Mr. Patil pointed out that data collection was being carried out across the nation and it was necessary to provide it to ensure that all health staff in the district got access to vaccine once it was launched. “Irrespective of which country develops the vaccine, WHO has decided to provide it to all health staff on a priority basis,” he said.
District Reproductive and Child Health officer S.M. Honakeri said that the National Expert Group on Vaccine Administration for COVID-19 (NEGVAC), led by member of Niti Aayog V.K. Paul had already been constituted and the committee would identify the priority areas.
“Details are being collected on frontline health staff, including nurses, Accredited Social Health Activists (ASHAs), supervisors, doctors of different medical systems, pharmacists, physiotherapists, nursing assistants, ward boys, drivers, security staff, cleaning workers, paramedical staff, medical and paramedical students. The hospitals are required to provide their data,” he said.
Dr. Honakeri said that there were 3,855 doctors and staff in government hospitals and all of them had provided the information already. However, of the 1,316 private medical establishments in the district, only 433 had provided information so far, he said and asked them to provide data by Wednesday.
Representative of WHO Siddalingayya briefed about the process of providing data through a presentation. He asked private hospitals to contact Manjunath on Ph: 9535663384 or Satish on Ph: 9448693023 for clarification and further details. District Health and Family Welfare Officer Yashwanth Madeenkar, District Surgeon Shivakumar Mankar and others were present.
