The ICU for Covid patients at SCB Medical College and Hospital
BHUBANESWAR: Amid rising load on critical care beds due to surge in Covid infections, the state government on Friday announced a two-pronged strategy. Four teams of experts will visit intensive care units (ICUs) to find out ‘influential’ patients who may be occupying ICU beds unnecessarily. They would be shifted to general beds so that more critical ones in waiting can be admitted to ICUs. Secondly, the government will add 400 more ICU beds within a week.
Additional chief secretary (health) Pradipta Kumar Mohapatra said during daily discussions with doctors, it has come to light that a good number of patients who should be in general beds are in ICUs, mainly in Bhubaneswar and Cuttack.
New BMC commissioner Sanjay Kumar Singh at a Covid vaccination centre in Bhubaneswar on Friday
BHUBANESWAR: Changing its priority of administering the second dose of Covishield to those who have already got the first dose, the state government on Friday decided to inoculate as many as possible in the 45+ age group with the first dose. The move comes after the Centre increased the gap between two doses of Covishield from 6-8 weeks now to a minimum of 12 weeks.
Additional chief secretary (health) Pradipta Kumar Mohapatra said there are not that many people due for second dose. “That is the reason the government will now give priority to people who have not been inoculated even once,” Mohapatra said.
Picture used for representational purpose only
BHUBANESWAR: The active cases in Odisha breached the one-lakh mark on Thursday, for the first time, after 10,649 people more tested positive for Covid-19 in the last 24 hours. Altogether 13 states and UTs in the country now have more than one lakh active cases, with Odisha being on the 13th spot (1,00,313 cases).
The number of new infections has grown by 2.1% in the state, on an average, in the last one week, which is more than the national average of 1.7%. The state has added more than one lakh new infections in the last 10 days.
While the state’s positivity rate was 20.69% on Thursday, it has been above 20%, on an average, for the last one week. While 29 of the state’s 30 districts, with the only exception of Malkangiri, have been witnessing a TPR of above 10% in the last one week, the TPR of 20 districts has been above 20% from May 6 to May 12.
Homeward Bound
BHUBANESWAR: Many people coming from other states are allegedly not following home quarantine rules. The trend is more visible in rural areas where migrant workers returning to their villages have been staying with family members and interacting other villagers flouting quarantine rules.
Many people do not have separate room with toilet at home. For that reason the government had launched institutional quarantine facility at the block level. But many people are not informing local sarpanches about their return and quietly staying with family, flouting quarantine rules.
“I do not know whom to approach to stay at a quarantine home. I got down at Chatrapur station and came home. I tried to isolate myself at home but it is not possible in a two-room house with six family members. I have no symptoms, so I am not worried,” said a migrant worker from Ganjam, who recently returned from Karnataka.
A consignment of Covishield reaches Bhubaneswar Airport
BHUBANESWAR: More than a week after the Centre opened vaccination for 18-44 age group, the state intend to expand inoculation to only four more cities Cuttack, Sambalpur, Berhampur and Rourkela by Monday due to short-supply of Covishield.
While the process has begun in Bhubaneswar on May 3, following the arrival of 1.5 lakh doses of Covaxin which is used in the city, rest of the state had to wait for some more days.
The state received its first consignment of one lakh doses of Covishield from Serum Institute of India (SII) on Saturday against the state’s need for 3.77 crore doses for administering vaccines to those in the 18-44 age group.