Positivity rate 6% higher in urban areas, Punjab tells high court
Submissions made during resumed hearing of a plea in which HC is monitoring Covid mgmt in Chandigarh, Punjab & Haryana
CHANDIGARH: The Punjab government on Tuesday told the high court that the case positivity rate in urban areas is 16% against 9.9% in rural areas in the month of May, so far. At present, there are 50,234 active cases in urban areas and 20,854 in rural areas, the government told the court. These submissions were made during resumed hearing of a plea in which court is monitoring Covid-19 management in Punjab, Haryana and Chandigarh. The government told court that 4.7 lakh samples were taken in urban areas and 3.2 lakh in rural areas out of which 75,308 people in urban area and 31,978 in rural areas tested positive.
The court was further told that facilities to treat non-critical patients are being uniformly created in urban and rural areas and government has decided to add 2,000 more such beds.
On vaccination, the court was told that it has placed an order of 30 lakh doses with Serum Institute of India out of which 4.29 lakh will be delivered by monthend. The state has also ordered 1.19 lakh Covaxin doses, same are also to be made available by month-end, the court was informed, adding that the vaccine wastage in state was 4.17%.
‘Mandatory jabs need deliberations’
Punjab has also told the court that there are provisions to make vaccination compulsory for government employees. “Any policy decision on whether mandatory vaccination is required need more deliberations at various levels to evolve a criteria of outlining the population upon whom it can be made mandatory, the state told the court.
The Centre on Tuesday told the court that all help is being rendered to two states and Chandigarh in Covid-19 management. As many as 675 ventilators have been allotted to Punjab, 548 to Haryana and 65 to Chandigarh. “If a complaint regarding any fault in the ventilator is received, the same is immediately attended to. An effort is being made to ensure that most of them remain functional,” the court was told.