Minister for Health Alla Kali Krishna Srinivas has said that three more VRDL (corona testing labs) will start soon in Guntur, Kadapa and Visakhapatnam. The State has four such labs in Vijaywada (Siddartha Medical College), Sri Venkateswara Medical College ( Tirupati), Regional Medical College (Kakinada) and Anantapur.
The Minister’s statement comes after the State government announced that testing would be scaled up to 1,000 samples per day. Identification and testing of those showing symptoms of coronavirus emerged as the most potent way of aggressively targeting the virus.
Sanitising initiative
The Minister, who reviewed the containment measures in the district , later told the media here on Thursday that so far 332 samples had been tested, out of which 289 turned out to be negative. Ten samples tested positive so far and the results of 33 were awaited.
Referring to the measures taken up in Guntur after a positive case was reported from Mangaldas Nagar, the Minister said that aggressive sanitising was done and 9,800 homes were sanitised by spraying sodium hypochrloride solution. The district administration deployed 70 teams and five close relatives of the affected person had been shifted to the isolation ward in Vijayawada.
The State has set up four isolation facilities in Nellore, Visakhapatnam, Vijayawada and Tirupati. The centres are equipped with advanced facilities such as ventilators.
Ration at doorstep
Further, Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy had taken a decision to provide ration at the doorstep of the people and give a subsistence allowance of Rs. 1000 on March 29.
Minister for Fisheries Mopidevi Venkata Ramana Rao said that the aqua industry had been the worst-hit, and added that instructions had been given to the police and transport department personnel to allow the vehicles to transport aqua products. He also said that China had lifted curbs on import of seafood, and this was a good news for the aqua sector.
Minister for Home M. Sucharitha, district Collector I. Samuel Ananda Kumar, IG of Police J. Prabhakara Rao, DIG of Police, Guntur Urban, P.H.D. Ramakrishna, Joint Collector A.S. Dinesh Kumar were present.
