With daily COVID-19 cases in the city on the decline, the civic body has shifted focus to wards with high caseload and positivity rate. Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) Chief Commissioner Gaurav Gupta, who is in home isolation after testing positive for COVID-19, chaired a virtual review meeting of the pandemic situation in the city on Thursday. “Case trends over the past week across all eight zones show there is about 30% reduction in day-on-day case numbers across all zones. Positivity rate has also reduced from over 25% levels to the range of 17%-20%,” he said. Bengaluru reported a record 30,540 cases on January 20, but by Thursday, the number of new positives had dropped to 17,717 cases. However, there are pockets with a high caseload. For instance, BTM Layout, Malleswaram, HSR Layout, and Konanakunte wards have a high caseload. Mr. Gupta directed officials to map the positivity rates of RAT and RT-PCR test results across all zones and earmark wards with high positivity rates. “We need to take strict measures in these wards, enforce stricter containment measures to arrest the spread of infection,” he said.
He also directed officials to speed up the vaccination drive. Meanwhile, BBMP has decided to close down all COVID-19 Care Centres (CCCs) with zero admissions. With most positive patients in home isolation, CCCs are mostly unoccupied. Mr. Gupta said mobile triaging units should physically triage all cases recommended hospitalisation/CCC admission the same day, and aim to cover 10-15% of the overall caseload.
