UDHAGAMANDALAM: The Nilgiris has seen nearly 30% dip in the fresh cases of Covid-19 and 13% fall in the active cases over the past 10 days.
The drop in the caseload has reduced the burden on the district administration to ramp up health infrastructure.
As per the data available with the health department, the daily caseload had come down to 415 on Saturday from 584 on June 3, while the active cases had dropped to 3,700 from 4207 during the period.
Dr P Balusamy, director of public health, attributed the dip in the caseload to strict containment measures.
“We had cordoned off streets with three or more cases and deployed police personnel there to curb the movement of people and local transmission of virus.” There are more than 650 containment zones in the Nilgiris, where the district administration, in association with the revenue department, has ensured steady supply of groceries and vegetables.
Balusamy said fever camps had helped identify positive cases in the early stages of infection.
“Tracing of primary and secondary contacts of positive cases and isolating them had also helped curtail the transmission of the virus to a certain level.” Regular area-wise surveys had also yielded good results in the district.
“Every volunteer was allotted 100 houses in an area, where one would visit the houses on alternative days to identify symptomatic people.
More than 300 volunteers are involved in the door-to-door survey,” the official said.
Health officials are, meanwhile, mainly concentrating on rural areas, Scheduled Caste settlements and areas where estate workers reside.
Balusamy said 62 vaccinated people had tested positive for the virus in the second wave.
“All of them were aged above 60 years and none of them required intense medical attention.
Our priority is to inoculate the working-class people and the tribal population first.
The vaccination drive is underway.”