Tracking to testing: Control rooms at forefront of efforts to contain spread
NEWDELHI:With more than 100 positive Covid-19 cases detected in at least nine states around the country -- apart from Delhi -- Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu and Kerala, among others, have set up control rooms to act as nodal centres to track the spread of the virus by processing real-time data from the districts, coordinating door-to-door surveillance, and testing people. Here is a look at what how these control rooms function.
UTTAR PRADESH
A 1,600 sq feet hall on the fourth floor of the health directorate office in Lucknow has about 20 people sitting before computer screens processing data, making calls, and coordinating with health officials in 75 districts.
“We are connected to the state helpline (18001805145) to get inputs from across the state. We are also in touch with officials to pass on necessary inputs to districts,” said a staff member, requesting anonymity.
The control room has data of nearly 60,000 people with names, cell numbers and addresses.
“The number of outbound calls had gone up to 2,000 a day when migrant workers were entering the state last week,” a control room official said. UP has earmarked 246 hospitals to treat Covid-19 patients.
TELANGANA
Control rooms have been set up at the state secretariat in Hyderabad, the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation office, and at all three major police commissionerates in Hyderabad, Cyberabad and Rachakonda. Apart from these, each district has its own control rooms to monitor Covid-19 cases and to enforce the national lockdown.
The statewide control rooms are monitored by two IAS officers, Rahul Bojja and Anil Kumar; while the state ministers of information technology, health, animal husbandry and home coordinate regularly with the chief minister’s office.
The district control room interacts with the police and medical teams tracking Covid-19 suspects through door-to-door surveillance. An application, TSCop, helps geotag the houses of foreign returnees .
TAMIL NADU
The state has a 200-person strong 24x7 control room run out of the Directorate of Public Health office in Chennai, in addition to specific control rooms in each district. “We have a portal (stopcorona.tn.gov.in) on which we put out information,” a senior official from the National Health Mission - Tamil Nadu said.
Districts provide three updates to the state control room every day: one on medical supplies, and two daily reports on the number of people quarantined; their health status, how many samples have been tested, and how many have tested positive. Responsibilities have been divided at the state control room: collecting data on home quarantines; an integrated disease surveillance portal desk where the acute respiratory infection details are entered; and a dedicated call centre for the public.
KERALA
One-hundred and twenty officials work in the central control room in three shifts. Kerala’s toll free helpline (1056) is monitored from this facility.
The network of people on the ground who survey their areas submit reports to district medical officers every day. These are fed to the district control room, which sends it to the state control room, where at least four people have been assigned to each district.
Apartfromgivinginstructions to the ground staff, these control rooms track people who have returned from overseas and made self-declarations at airports and police stations. Those under quarantine use a geotracking application that maps their movements if they step out of their homes. Information about them is tracked by local body workers and sent to the control rooms.
Kerala has six Covid-only hospitals and each of the 14 districts have Covid care homes.
KARNATAKA
The central control room has at least 120 people from various government departments tasked to update district-wise numbers, track developments, field calls, and coordinate efforts across the states.
Bangalore-based Pro-digital labs helped the government setup the control room. While initially the tracking was through excel sheets, now a specialised app called “Quarantine Watch” has been built in-house by the government.
All those under home quarantine are required to upload hourly photos/selfies. This app automatically sends location data, which is checked to ensure that those being tracked are actually at the location they claim to be. Locally, information at district level is fed by Asha workers, Anganwadi workers and village volunteers. The data is centrally collated at the war room to monitor progress and track patients.
Several government and private hospitals have been set aside for Covid-19 patients.
MAHARASHTRA
The state has set up a dedicated control room in state secretariat, with 14 senior bureaucrats handling different responsibilities. For instance, Manoj Saunik, additional chief secretary, finance, has been tasked with ensuring that all government departments receive the grants allotted to them, while Rajiv Jalota, additional chief secretary, has been directed to formulate measures to implement all policy decisions taken by different departments.
The state has earmarked 30 government hospitals and 1,000 private hospitals for free treatment of Covid-19 patients.
ANDHRA PRADESH
A control centre at Vijayawada operates round-the-clock with staff from 21 government departments working in shifts. It fields about 1,000 calls every day on a toll free number (104) for Covid-19 related questions and concerns.
A state-level task force has been set under CM’s office, while each district has separate control centres. Village and ward volunteers, secretariat employees, auxiliary nurse midwives (ANMs) and Asha workers survey houses and record details of people who have come from abroad or other states and check for symptoms.