While the Covid-19 cases are increasing fast in the State Capital and other parts of the State, Shivraj Government has decided to turn several luxury hotels into paid quarantine centres.
Identified in Rewa, Bhopal, Ujjain and Gwalior, these hotels can be used for quarantine purpose by paying a per day charge. These include hotels from private sector and those run by MP State Tourism Development Corporation as well.
In Bhopal, private hotels and those from MPSTDC have bene turned into quarantine centres with the charges ranging from Rs 800 to Rs 3,000 per day. However, no other city could declare private hotel as a quarantine centre besides Bhopal. The Bhopal district administration has issued a list of 19 such hotels in Bhopal.
The state government will continue to run the free quarantine facilities for the suspects but if someone did not wish to move to these facilities, the person can opt for a hotel.
Bhopal collector Avinash Lavania said that as per norms, being quarantine is mandatory for those who are first contacts of Covid-19 infected persons. If these persons do not wish to be kept in government centres, they could opt for private hotels which fulfil the norms.
The government run quarantines are constantly under the scanner for poor maintenance and upkeep in the state. Recently the quarantined people had reported worms in the food packets offered to them and a probe has been ordered by the administration afterwards.
Besides, people kept at most of the quarantine centres including at RGTU, TB hospital and IISER complain of delay in breakfast and meals, unsafe common wahsrooms, dearth of potable water and sanitisers, dearth of medicines and others.
Bhopal seems to be heading for some tough time as far as covid19 infection is concerned as on Wednesday, the city report 246 fresh cases in last 24 hours. As against some infected clusters, large numbers of areas ranging from slums to posh colonies are now reporting cases of infections.
The situation is also grim at Indore, Jabalpur and Gwalior.
The dedicated hospitals — Chirayu, AIIMS and government run Hamidia too are packed to capacity. However, the cabinet meet held on Tuesday decided to increase the beds in covid care hospitals and testing facilities.
The cases of infections have crossed 7,000 in Indore while the same are nearing 6,000 mark in Bhopal. Total numbers of cases reached 29,000 on Tuesday including 830 deaths. Much to the respite of Shivraj government, over 20,000 have recovered from the virus till now.
In a review, CM Shivraj Singh Chouhan on Tuesday ordered to increase number of beds for covid19 patients to 12,000 from existing 8,000 and also ordered increase in testing facilities.
Chouhan also expressed concern over growing cases of infections in Barwani and Chhatarpur.