Telangana to conduct 50,000 tests per day

Senior health officials have urged the public to realise that the Covid-19 pandemic is not over yet and the community as a whole must follow Covid-appropriate behaviour

Hyderabad: Amid growing concerns over the steady rise in Covid infections in the neighbouring States, especially Maharashtra, the Health Department here on Friday decided to refocus its energies in further tightening the surveillance measures and ramp up Covid tests to 50,000 per day.

Senior health officials have urged the public to realise that the Covid-19 pandemic is not over yet and the community as a whole must follow Covid-appropriate behaviour. Masking, physical distancing, maintaining hand hygiene, avoiding large gatherings and vaccinating priority groups are the only way to avoid what many epidemiologists increasingly believe to be the second wave of Covid infections in the country.

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As part of its efforts to control the spread of new infections, the department would aggressively implement the strategy of test, trace, isolate and treat. Covid tests will be ramped up to 50,000 per day across all government healthcare facilities.

To quickly trace new infections, the health authorities would further intensify surveillance across all the districts and identify hotspots, officials said.

To hammer out a proper response to the threat of a rise in infections, Health Minister Eatala Rajender on Friday held a virtual meeting with Health Principal Secretary SAM Rizvi, Director of Public Health Dr G Srinivasa Rao, Director of Medical Education (DME) Dr K Ramesh Reddy and District Medical and Health Officers (DM&HOs).

“We will focus on early testing, tracing and treating. We will leave no stone unturned to ensure the new infections are quickly identified. General public too must continue to follow Covid-appropriate behaviour,” Rajender said.
The threat of new infections in the State is also from districts in Maharashtra like Akola, Yavatmal and Nagpur, which are under lockdown.

“We share our borders with Maharashtra, Karnataka and Chhattisgarh, which are problematic in terms of Covid infections. That’s why, surveillance measures have been intensified,” senior health officials said.

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