Kolkata: Samrat Sen, a resident of Jadavpur Sulekha and a banker on Monday registered his father-in-law’s name with Covid cells from Swasthya Bhawan to shift critical covid patients from private hospitals to hospitals appointed by the government.
On Tuesday, Sen got a call from the State Health Department who asked whether family members directly from critical patients had a Covid test (RT-PCR)? When Sen answered negatively, the caller gave a 72-hour deadline for the Sen family and confirmed that if there was no test done within the time, the State Health Department would send a team to their Jadavpur address for the collection.
Sen said they themselves will be tested for Covid without waiting for Swasthya Bhawan’s worker to do the job.
“I am currently busy with my father-in-law’s treatment.
I will set RT-PCR tests for each family member who has been closely related to the patient,” said Sen.
According to the revised protocol, testing regulations in community settings will be carried out for symptomatic patients which are close contact positive cases, asymptomatic contacts above 60 and those who have comorbidities, simtomatic pregnant women, asymptomatic pregnant women who approach labor if they are close contact and those who need international trips.
In the case where Tele callers found one of these they requested a test report within 72 hours.
As part of a contract search, the State Health Department and KMC have decided to do a compulsory RT-PCR test on people who come with close contact with covid positive patients.
The state’s health and KMC callers engaged in the contract search provide a 72-hour deadline to relatives of covid positive patients to be tested.
Otherwise, the country and civil body send their own team for a collection of swabs.
According to a KMC health department official, Tele caller has been asked to take a job that traces contracts seriously to prevent the spread of infections in the environment where some addresses have or still have positive covid patients.
Tele callers are also advised to record the fact whether adequate tests are being carried out to determine the existence of infections in residents of tall buildings and apartment buildings where more than four people have been tested positively.
KMC Covid combat team members said stress for more testing in families where some positive covid patients suddenly turned into critical.
“We oversee positive covid patients who even though they do not have a co-morbidity factor that turns critical.
In such cases, family members must be tested,” said Civic officials.