Manipur to increase COVID-19 care centres to tackle the sudden rise of cases

Imphal: Manipur government will expand capacity at its COVID-19 care centres to deal with the sudden rise in coronavirus cases in the state.

Principal secretary for health & family welfare V Vumlunmang informed that the state witnessed the increase in positivity rate following lockdown relaxation.

However, as per the Virus Spread Assessment Matrix (VAM) for microstates, Manipur continued in the green zone with a 4.5 per cent test positivity rate (TPR) and the mortality rate (MR) is 0.7 per cent, which is much lower than the national TPR, informed Vumlunmang.

In India, the TPR stands at 7.5 per cent and MR at 1.5 per cent. In the microstates, the overall test positivity rate is 6.77 per cent, and the mortality rate is at 1.2 per cent.

“After the lockdown relaxation in August in the state, people have started to venture out from homes, engage on various businesses and participate in programmes because of which cases increased,” said Vumlunmang.

COVID-19 care centre at Bal Bhawan Khuman Lampak in Imphal have started fully functioning from Friday.

There are around 36 COVID-19 care centres with over 2,500 bedding capacity, including JNIMS and RIMS hospitals with dedicated wards for treating coronavirus patients and three state-level COVID-19 facilities.

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The government has instructed all hospitals to set up separate rooms for the COVID-19 patients.

Pregnant women who are COVID-19 positive will now have proper obstetrics and gynaecology care in the hospitals, added Vumlunmang.

The state plans to continue its focus on increased testing to isolate and reduce transmission. At least 2,000 to 3,000 samples get tested every day in Manipur; This adds to 90,000 persons per million which is above the national average.

Moreover, in terms of containment zone in some worst affected areas, a meeting was held with DCs and CMOs of Imphal East and Imphal West districts as a priority since the districts have reported high cases of local transmission.

Localities with maximum COVID-19 cases will be identified and contained for 10 to 14 days to control spread, added Vumlunmang.

At present, the total confirmed positive cases in the state stands at 14,715 with 337 new cases reported in the last 24 hours, while the recovered and active patients are 11,245 and 3,361, respectively.

On Friday, another five more COVID-19 patients were reportedly succumbed to the virus, taking the deaths toll in the state to 109.

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