Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath said that apprehensions of the spread of corona infection in villages forced him to hit ground zero to assess the situation himself. He said continuous efforts were being made to successfully contain the pandemic. On a district-level review tour, the CM took stock of the functioning and arrangements in Sidharthnagar and Basti on Thursday.
The chief minister visited Jogia village of Siddharthnagar and interacted with the members of surveillance committees at a primary school and also inspected the Community Health Centre in the village. Later, he held a meeting with public representatives and officials at the DM office and addressed mediapersons at the Reserve Police Lines in Siddharthnagar.
Yogi said that there were predictions that between April 25 and May 10, UP would report around 1 lakh cases per day and the situation would spin out of control, but the state registered a decline of 85 per cent in active corona cases.
“In the last 24 hours, only 3,278 fresh Covid cases were reported while the active cases have come down from 3.10 lakh to 58,270 within just 26 days in the state. Besides, the recovery rate has improved and surpassed 95 per cent as of today while the positivity rate has declined to just 1 per cent,” he said.
The CM further said that the state was aggressively conducting Covid testing in rural pockets with RRTs going door-to-door and carrying out antigen tests.
“The surveillance committees are doing well by isolating symptomatic people and distributing medicine kits at a large scale. We have to save the life of every person by screening, treatment and vaccination. My government is also working on a strategy to prevent encephalitis and other vector-borne diseases along with COVID-19,” he said.
Yogi further said that children were being feared to be more affected in the third corona wave for which medicine kits will be arranged and distributed to them soon and separate guardian booths were being set up in every district for the parents of children below 12 years of age.
“To intensify vaccination and to protect the children from the third wave, the government will identify and vaccinate the parents of children below 12 years on a priority basis from June 1,” he said.
The chief minister also said that UP, being the most populous state, fought well against coronavirus by carrying out an aggressive testing campaign under the test, trace and treat mechanism besides augmenting the health infrastructure and increasing the number of beds in hospitals across the state. On oxygen supply, the CM said that the state witnessed oxygen shortage at the beginning of the second wave but now the government is working with full force to make every district self-sufficient in terms of oxygen supply.
From Siddharthnagar, the chief minister went to Basti in the afternoon where he reviewed the arrangements of Integrated Command and Control Centre and gave directions to provide better facilities to patients. He also visited Kaili Hospital where he inspected 50-bed wards being set up for children. During the inspection, he also inquired from officials about oxygen supply and was told that there was no shortage of the life-saving fluid in the divisional headquarters.