Chennai: The Tamilnadu government is all prepared to encounter a possible third wave of the Covid-19 pandemic, Health Minister Ma Subramanian told the State Assembly recently.
Moving the demand for grants for his department, he said due to the proactive and aggressive approach, Tamilnadu was able to bring down the daily case load from a high of about 36,200 cases in mid-May to less than 1,600 and is making efforts to bring it down further.
Active cases also have come down from the level of 3.13 lakh cases in May to below 18,000 now. The State currently has a recovery rate of about 98 per cent, Reduced death rate at 1.34 per cent, daily positivity rate has reduced to about 1.0 per cent with day-to-day and inter and intra district variations.
On encountering the possinle third wave, Subrmanian said an Expert Committee Meeting for third Wave Planning was planned much earlier than many other States and was convened on June three with several leading public health experts in the country.
A special Task force has been constituted with eminent public health experts. The members of this Task Force meet every week and closely monitor the current situation in the State.
A special Task Force under the State Child Health Nodal officer was also convened and an Action Plan was laid down for managing paediatric cases during the third wave.
Subramanian said a detailed analysis was made by the Covid-19 State War Room explaining the patterns of the third wave in other countries and strategies taken to contain and mitigate the spread of infection.
“Based on assumptions made, specific requirements for O2 and ICU, Ventilator and other Respiratory devices Requirement, LMO production, Supply chain, O2 cylinder availability, O2 cylinder filling, O2 generators PSA / ASU, Human Resources and drugs were calculated for various possible scenarios,” the Minister said.
The State was also getting ready with district-wise preparedness plans and amplifying its readiness by stepping up facility-based testing, sero surveillance and genomic sequencing.
The Minister at the present the thrust was on vaccination and localised containment and active surveillance followed by test, trace, treat, vaccinate and encourage and enforce follow-up of Covid-19 appropriate behaviour which has resulted in gradual reduction of cases throughout the State.
Subrmanian said Covid is under control in the State and is being closely monitored. Subramanian said vaccination is being given a full thrust on a drive mode to mobilize the General Public to come forward for vaccination.
The Union government as on 29 August, has supplied 3.05 crore doses of Covid vaccine to Tamilnadu, while 21.90 lakh doses have been received through the private sector.
He said on 7 May, 63,28,407 doses were administered and as on 29 August it has risen to 2.94 crore doses through the State government. In addition 21.03 lakh doses were administered through the private hospitals.
The State has been vaccinating more than three lakh people every day of the week and is capable of increasing it to seven lakh a day subject to receipt of regular supplies of vaccines.
With the vaccine drive, and continued vigil, it is hoped that the impact of Covid-19 will come down further in the coming days.
In order to meet the increased demand, the State government has taken up the issue with the Union government to increase the allotment of vaccines based on population.
He also said Chief Minister M K Stalin launched free vaccination in private hospitals through CSR initiative on 28 July.