As active COVID-19 cases in the State surged to 12,616, with the daily positivity rate climbing to over 5%, Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh on Wednesday urged the Centre to review its immunisation strategy to vaccinate all age groups in selected areas, while announcing a stricter policy to deal with the problem.
The Chief Minister also called for occupation-based immunisation for school and college students and teachers, judges, bus drivers and conductors, panch-sarpanch, mayors, counsellors, MLAS, MPs etc. to pave the way for normalisation of crucial activities and check “super-spreaders”. He advocated early opening of courts to end the citizens’ wait for justice, and also of schools and colleges to bridge the gap between poor and affluent families in terms of education.
The Chief Minister blamed the surge in cases on laxity in following COVID-19 appropriate behaviours, large social and religious gatherings, and efforts at normalisation such as opening of schools and colleges. “Large positivity was seen in the State’s young population,” he said, adding that the trend was worrying as Punjab had reported a total of 1,475 cases and 38 deaths on March 16, preceded by 1,843 cases and 43 deaths the day before it. He pointed out that State Finance Minister Manpreet Badal and Shiromani Akali Dal president Sukhbir Badal had also tested positive for the coronavirus. “We are making a policy, we will get stricter from tomorrow,” he added.
During Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s virtual COVID-19 review meeting with Chief Ministers of all States, Captain Amarinder suggested that any area where weekly testing shows a doubling of positivity rates should immediately be considered for vaccination of all age groups. This, he said, would lead to better outcomes than the periodic cycles of vaccination targeting a small section of the population at each cycle. The daily positivity rate has climbed to more than 5% in March from a low of less than 1% in January. So far, a total of 1.99 lakh positive cases had been reported from 54 lakh tests, and 6,099 people had died of the infection, he added.
Apart from covering the entire population in selected areas, certain co-morbidity situations among those below 45 years, such as persons with kidney and liver diseases, should also be covered across the State, the Chief Minister recommended, as Punjab continued to grapple with its second peak, which began around mid-February 2021.
With the role of virus mutation still unclear, the Chief Minster underlined the need to strengthen viral sequencing, particularly in Punjab, “as over 50% positive cases now are below 40 years of age, and we need to urgently assess whether this is due to any variant”. The State, he disclosed, had sent a large number of samples for genome sequencing but very few results had been received, of which two had indicated the presence of a variant.
During the meeting, Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal said that taking serious cognisance of the recent surge of COVID-19 cases, the State had already ramped up its COVID-19 management preparations coupled with aggressive surveillance, stringent containment, swift contact tracing and focused clinical management, along with proactive Information Education and Communication (IEC) activities.
The Chief Minister said that while swiftly acting to the present COVID-19 situation, a mega vaccination drive had been run across the State. “We have planned to launch such mega drives on every Monday and Tuesday to ensure that every beneficiary receives vaccination doses,” he said.
