Health Minister K.K. Shylaja has come down hard on those “instigating” the fisher community at Poonthura to hold organised protests on streets without any safety precautions, even after a superspreader event resulted in 243 new COVID-19 cases being reported from the area in the past three days.
Addressing the media through an online platform on Friday, Ms. Shylaja said Kerala would be facing a catastrophe if popular protests during the pandemic took on the form it did in Poonthura, especially since it looked like the local transmission of COVID-19 was spreading from the coastal area to other parts of the city.
Vested interests
Ms. Shylaja was talking to the media after the local community at Poonthura took to the streets in the morning to protest against the “discrimination” against coastal folk, the lack of facilities provided to patients, and for not providing amenities for daily living to the families.
According to the Minister, some vested interests tried to stir up confusion amongst the fisherfolk by spreading false information that the rapid viral antigen tests that were being conducted in large numbers in the area, following the COVID outbreak there, were not reliable tests and that these tests were picking up healthy people as positive cases.
She said while those who tested positive at Poonthura in the past three days were not sick and had only mild symptoms or were asymptomatic, they had to be observed for the next 14 days because none could actually predict which of these persons would suddenly develop serious disease. However, there seemed to be some misunderstanding amongst the people that healthy people were being sent to quarantine, she said.
Unusual situation
The Minister also said the local people had been put into some difficulties following the sudden imposition of triple lockdown.
But it was an unusual situation that called for unusual measures and the government was trying its best to take care of all grievances.
Rapid antigen tests done in Aryanad had found six positive cases and another 15 in Manacaud area. More test kits would be utilised in areas where disease transmission was intense to detect people quickly while in hospitals, the primary testing modality would continue to be PCR-based.
Temporary hospitals
She said the government had identified two centres in Poonthura itself, where temporary COVID hospitals would be set up immediately to ensure that the mild or asymptomatic patients from the locality could be cared for there.
These two centres could accommodate 150 or more people. One more centre would be opened up as soon as the place was identified. With local disease transmission intensifying in many areas, the attempt was to ensure that the surge was limited to the localities without spread.
Physical distancing and mask-wearing were important and stringent measures would have to be adopted in containment zones to limit the movement of people, Ms. Shylaja said. She appealed to political parties to desist from holding mass protests on the roads or else the State would squander away any advantage it might have had so far in COVID containment.
