The Health Department wouldlaunch close monitoring with necessary standard operating procedures at all hospitals here to contain possible spread of COVID-19 from April 20 when lockdown relaxations are relaxed, Puducherry Health minister Malladi Krishna Rao said on Saturday.He said restrictions would be relaxed from Monday and this would pave the way for influx of large number of people from neighbouring states to Puducherry for health care services."We should be very careful and vigilant as any imported infection would be a great problem for Puducherry which now has established an encouraging record of containing the spread of the infection," Rao said.He said the turnout at the out-patient departments in hospitals would be high following relaxation of the lockdown restrictions."We face no problem within Puducherry but once people from outside the Union Territory surge into Puducherry we will face certain difficulties and hence a close monitoring would be necessary in a coordinated manner," he added.He said Puducherry had eight positive cases.Of them six were in the Indira Gandhi Government General Hospital and Research Institute in Puducherry and two of these patients had already been discharged following recovery.Mahe,an enclave of Puducherry in Kerala, reported discharge of one person and death of another in neighbouring Kerala hospital recently.He said that door-to-door surveillance had also been launched by teams of health professionals to assess the health status of the people.So far 2,35,324 houses were surveyed by the teams covering around 8.96 lakh people."The surveillance would continue to cover the entire population in the Union Territory," he said.Secretary to Health Prashant Kumar Panda, who was also present,said the strict adherence to the norms of social distancing and voluntary isolation on the part of the people had been chiefly responsible for keeping the spread of the virus at bay in the union territory."Of the total 1184 samples tested under the RTCRT system 1017 people tested negative," he said.Director of Health and Family Welfare Services S Mohan Kumar said the government hospital here,which has been designated as COVID-19 institution, is fully equipped to meet any exigency.There were 35 ventilators and 25 more ventilators would be available in the next few days.He said no new case of COVID-19 had been reported during the last 15 days in the union territory.
