WON’T LET GUARD DOWN IN SLUMS: BMC
Once bitten, the civic body doesn’t want to be complacent about the low figures emerging from the slum pockets
While Mumbai has been hit by a surge in COVID-19 cases, very few are emerging from its slum pockets. As per the latest Brihan-Mumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) data, the maximum city has 16 slum areas that are marked as active containment zones, of which seven are in S ward (Powai, Kanjurmarg and Bhandup), four are in L ward (Kurla, Asalpha and Chandivli) two are in H East ward (Bandra East and Khar East) and one each in F South (Parel, Sewri and Currey Road), E ward (Byculla) and A ward (Cuffe Parade and Navy Nagar).
Senior civic officials, however, do not want to become complacent and have ramped up the number of tests being conducted in slum areas. Additional Municipal Commissioner Suresh Kakani said that he reviewed the situation last week and directed all the local ward officers to ramp up the tests being conducted like last year. "The spread of the virus is scattered. Positive cases are emerging from both buildings and slum areas and there is no specific pattern in the spread," Kakani told the Free Press Journal. "This is why we are not getting carried away with the low figures and are continuing with the tests," he added.
Dr Vilas Mohoskar, medical officer of health (MOH), S ward, said that, following the rise in the number of cases since mid-February, the quarantine centres which were shut down have been reactivated. "We have reactivated the quarantine centres and are shif ting all high risk patients from slum areas to these facilities. In the past one week, more than 35 high risk contacts have been shif ted to the quarantine centres," Mohoskar told the Free Press Journal. However, more than 90 per cent of the daily active cases are still being reported from high rises. “We are not shif ting those living in buildings to quarantine centres as they have their own facilities," he added. Kiran Dighavkar, assistant municipal commissioner and incharge of G North ward, under which the Dharavi belt falls, said that, in the past one week, there has been a rise in the number of cases in slum areas. As a precautionary measure, the 'Dharavi Model of Testing' has been reimplemented. "We have started door-todoor screening like we used to do earlier when Dharavi had become a hotspot," Dighavkar said.