Amid a surge in Covid-19 circumstances in Kerala, the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare has determined to depute a six-member high-level multi-disciplinary staff to the state to “collaborate” with the state’s well being authorities for administration of the outbreak.
The Central staff to Kerala is headed by Dr S Ok Singh, Director, National Centre for Disease Control, the ministry stated in a press release. It will attain the state on Friday and go to just a few districts, it stated.
Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya tweeted, “The team will aid state’s ongoing efforts in #COVID19 management.”
Kerala reported over 22,000 coronavirus circumstances for the third day in a row — it logged 22,064 new circumstances and 128 deaths on Thursday — taking the caseload to 33,49,365 and the toll to 16,585.
Meanwhile, the BJP and the state’s ruling CPI(M) traded barbs over the scenario, with the previous blaming “politics of appeasement” for the rise in circumstances in Kerala and criticising the state authorities for stress-free curbs.
“The Kerala government has tried to utilise this pandemic for political benefits and that’s the whole purpose of these relaxations. In fact, there was fake propaganda right from the beginning of the pandemic when the state government claimed that they have contained the Covid-19 due to their effective management,” Minister of State for External Affairs V Muraleedharan instructed Republic TV on Thursday.
“How some irresponsible politicians puts country at risk of COVID19 3rd wave, even as narendramodi govt has worked so hard to defeat Covid19SecondWave,” Union minister Rajeev Chandrasekhar tweeted.
BJP spokesperson Sambit Patra on Wednesday blamed “Eid relaxations” for the rise in circumstances, whereas BJP chief Amit Malviya stated the Muslim-majority Malappuram district clocked over 4,000 circumstances in a day.
Hitting again on the BJP, senior CPI(M) chief and former Finance Minister T M Thomas Isaac urged the Centre to offer extra vaccines to Kerala than “free advice”. He stated Kerala has the bottom seroprevalence of 44 per cent, and MP the best at 79 per cent. “It implies that Kerala has managed Covid better. Its multiple of seroprevalence to reported case load is also lowest. Therefore present spike in case load is due to failure of Centre in providing sufficient vaccine,” he stated.
“Kerala with an active case load of 1.54 lakh is contributing 37.1 per cent of the total active cases in the country, with a growth rate of 1.41 in the last seven days. Average daily cases being reported in the state are above 17,443,” the ministry stated.
