Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister Jai Ram Thakur once again ruled out possibilities of a weekend lockdown or night curfew in the state.
“The situation in the state is alarming yet under control. We do not have any shortage of emergency drugs – Remdesivir or oxygenated beds in the hospitals as of now,” he said after a detailed review of the Covid-19 situation this evening.
The chief minister said he himself has decided to travel to the districts, which are hotspots of coronavirus, to take stock of the situation.
“I have held review meetings at Mandi and Dharamshala. Tomorrow, I will be in Solan to hold a meeting at Nalagarh –an industrial belt and will later go to Una, the worst-affected district. Once I return, I will be able to decide if any weekend lockdown (as done by many states) is required or not,” he told media persons.
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Many states, including Punjab, Delhi, UP and Maharashtra have imposed weekend lockdowns and made RT-PCR test reports mandatory for the visitors to deal with a spurt in Covid cases.
Thakur said Covid-19 cases have witnessed a quantum jump in the state as the virus is spreading very fast and also resulting in high fatalities, especially persons with comorbidities.
The restrictions imposed by the government, including RT-PCR negative test reports for those coming from the high load areas, have been made a prerequisite.
There was an adequate supply of medicines, oxygenated beds, masks or sanitisers in the state. This will be further enhanced to meet any eventuality. The state has 2,000 Covid beds in government hospitals while four makeshift Covid hospitals have also been made functional at a few places.
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Thakur said along with a dedicated helpline for Covid-19 patients in home isolation, the use of e-Sanjeevani and telephone number 104 was being encouraged. He also instructed the doctors to contact the Covid patients in home isolation for counselling.
Ten more people lost their lives to Covid on Friday. The total number of active cases in the state rose to 7,710, an addition of 850 in the past 24 hours.
The death toll has rise to 1,155 till Friday against 982 in February 2021.
