The city Corporation will constitute 20-member volunteer teams in each of its 100 wards as part of intensifying precautionary steps to rein in the COVID-19 spread.
Convening an emergency meeting of the Corporation council, Mayor K. Sreekumar entrusted the councillors with drawing up lists of volunteers in their respective wards.
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Their activities will be finalised in the days to come. The council also decided to establish two handwash points in each ward. The local body will collaborate with IMAGE, an initiative of the Indian Medical Association, to collect used gloves and masks at such spots to ensure safe disposal. The parliamentary party leaders of political parties in the council also agreed to meet daily to assess the containment measures. The Mayor will convene meetings of Corporation officials twice daily to review activities.
The councillors suggested steps to enhance the existing measures. These included launching a door-to-door campaign and extending precautionary measures to the city suburbs. They also called for ensuring preparedness for a possible spurt in the number of diagnosed cases, considering the city’s floating population and large number of migrant workers who were employed in various sectors.
Tourism Minister Kadakampally Surendran, who participated in the meeting, lauded the Corporation for its emulative steps in containing the outbreak.
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He also urged ward councillors to remain vigilant about instances that could lead to a spread of the virus within communities.
Mr. Surendran cited the example of two doctors, residing in Belhaven Gardens, who were reported to have violated home quarantine to go for their morning walk.
He was also critical of the purported action of the daughter of an Airports Authority of India official to bypass screening at the Thiruvananthapuram international airport early Thursday. Such instances threatened to defeat the selfless efforts of others, he said.