Coronavirus cases in the country continue to rise. Till Saturday morning, there are a total of 24,506 confirmed cases.
Puducherry on Saturday reported one more coronavirus positive patient taking the toll of confirmed COVID-19 cases to 4 in the Union Territory, Director of Health and Family Welfare Services S Mohan Kumar informed. He said that an 18-year-old patient has been admitted to the Indira Gandhi Government Medical college hospital. The infected person has a contact history with one of the 3 persons who are undergoing treatment for coronavirus.
The hospital would conduct one more test on Sunday on the remaining one patient and also ascertain whether any one had had contact history Kumar said the Indira Gandhi Government Medical college hospital was a designated hospital authorised by the ICMR to conduct the tests.
"There are facilities to test atleast 50 patients every day," he said adding that the hospital uses the RTPCR equipment to conduct the test. The RT kits received from the Centre were not used as the ICMR had asked the health department here to avoid using the RT kits for some days now.
The Director said the Health Ministry had sent a circular to take all steps to protect the doctors, nurses and other health professionals involved in the treatment of the COVID 19 patients here.
"If there is any insecurity to the doctors and others they can report to a Nodal Officer appointed by the Police Department for follow up action," it said.
The culprits posing threat or inflicting violence on doctors would face stringent action and suffer serious imprisonment as envisaged under the law.
Kumar said as there was inflow of patients from neighbouring Tamil Nadu districts of Villupuram and Cuddalore, to Puducherry, a team of doctors have been stationed at the entry points. They would ascertain the seriousness of the condition of the patients coming to Puducherry from the neighbouring
districts identified as hotspots and only very serious and emergency cases would be permitted to get treatment here.
(With inputs from PTI)
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