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The Hindu
The Hindu
National
Special Correspondent

Ward-level teams for contact tracing

To tackle the humongous task of tracing contacts of people who have tested positive for COVID-19, the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) has formed 20-member teams that will operate at the ward level.

The new system had been put in place to deal with the backlog in contact tracing following the spike in cases in the city, said a senior civic official.

The teams include the ward level revenue inspector, assessor, tax inspector, junior / senior health inspectors, 10 teachers (residents of the same ward) and 10 volunteers. They will be monitored by block resource coordinators and cluster resource coordinators, who will then report to the zonal joint commissioners.

Immense pressure

The official added that before the spike in cases, the system could handle up to 300 cases. There was immense pressure on the system after the spike, which led to delay in contact tracing.“There is now an office in all wards, where the data entry can be done. The phone numbers of the teachers and volunteers have been listed and they can use the mobile application to input data,” said the official, who added that in a couple of days, monitoring will happen real-time.

To monitor the task at the Assembly constituency level, the civic body had roped in 26 probationary tahsildars. At the zonal level, a team has been constituted, including the zonal joint commissioner, Deputy Commissioner (Revenue), chief engineer, probationary Assistant Commissioner, health officer, epidemiologist and one official from the Education Department.

Latest figures

The BBMP war room report (June 7) stated that a total 3,100 primary contacts and 6,350 secondary contacts had been identified by the civic body so far.

Of the 3,100 primary contacts, 165 are under active quarantine. A total 1,273 secondary contacts of 6,350 were under active quarantine.

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