Bihar, which has reported 65 Covid-19 cases, with one death, believes it can combat the Sars-CoV-2 virus while handling the burden of other diseases as well.
The first indication of this came from Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, who on Sunday directed his health officials to resume treatment of general patients at all district and sub-divisional hospitals, after following necessary precautions for Covid-19.
Outpatient department (OPDs) services in these hospitals had been put on hold since March 25, after Prime Minister Narendra Modi declared 21-day nationwide lockdown.
Bihar’s confidence stems from the fact it has taken smart initiatives to contain the progression of the virus, said health officials.
“We decided to test all international passengers, who came between March 18 and 23 after we found that most Covid-19 cases in the state, since the first tested positive on March 21, had international travel history. The symptomatic ones, who came between March 15 and 17, were also tested,” said chief secretary Deepak Kumar.
The testing helped detect around 20-30 positive cases, said officials.
Bihar went for 100 per cent screening of foreign passengers, when the Centre’s guideline was to test only the symptomatic ones. It identified around 3,556 international travelers between March 15 and 23 and samples of 2,254 people, who were within the 14-day incubation period, were taken for tests.
Bihar was also quick to decide on containment zones and impose a strong lockdown, where people have not been allowed to move out of their homes and essential supplies delivered to them at their doorstep, said Sanjay Kumar, Bihar’s principal secretary, health.
“We have been keeping a watch on activities of villagers, especially in sensitive areas and those under containment zone, through drones,” added Kumar.
Panjwar village of Siwan district, where 23 of the 29 cases in the district were accounted to a superspreader, was the first to be put under the ‘red zone’ and complete barricading of the village was done at 200 metres, 500 metres, 1 kilometre, 2 kilometre and 3 kilometre.
Kadirabad in Begusarai district was also put under containment zone. Eight Indonesians of Tablighi Jamaat who were here in mid-March, are believed to have infected young boys, said top government sources, requesting anonymity.
Begusarai and Nawada have accounted for at least 10 Covid-19 cases, which were tracked to those having come either in contact with members of the Tablighi Jamaat or returnees from the Nizamuddin Markaz.
The government has also drawn up containment plan for Bahadurpur village in Nawada where a Tablighi Jamaat member, who returned from the Nizamuddin Markaz had tested positive. Later, a 45-year-old mason and a 16-year-old girl, who came in contact with the 38-year-old male, tested positive for the virus on Saturday.
The state has already sanitised two mosques in Nawada and seven in Begusari and is keeping close tabs on them, said officials.
The ICMR has approved four laboratories in Bihar for conducting real-time polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) tests of nose and throat swab, a confirmatory test for Covid-19. So far 7,611 samples had been collected of which 7,199 tested, at an average 103 tests per day. Of them, 65 were positive. Twenty-six people had so far recovered and discharged from hospitals.