Corona High Level Meeting: Prime minister Narendra Modi The Principal Secretary has held a high-level meeting on Saturday (December 31) regarding Corona. In this meeting, he reviewed the compliance of the instructions given in the high level meeting held on 22 December. The meeting held on December 22 was also presided over by Dr. PK Mishra, Principal Secretary to the PM. Senior officials and experts of the Government of India were also involved in today’s meeting.
Information was given about what has happened so far in this meeting and how much has been followed in the guidelines given. In this meeting, Dr. PK Mishra, Principal Secretary to the PM, was informed by the officials and experts about the evolving global scenario of the pandemic with increase in Covid cases in some countries including China, Japan, South Korea, Singapore, Brazil.
Mock drill on the instructions of PM Modi
As per the instructions of the Prime Minister, a mock drill was organized at all the health centers on 27th December. All the States/UTs participated in the mock drill to ensure the operational readiness of the COVID dedicated COVID facility with special focus on oxygen plants, ventilators, logistics and human resources. 21,097 medical facilities conducted the mock drill, of which 16,108 were government facilities.
Following the Prime Minister’s directive, detailed guidelines for 2% random screening of international passengers arriving in India were issued and 2% random sampling was started from 24 December. 1716 international flights were screened and 5666 samples were collected for COVID-19 testing.
And what happened after PM’s instructions
Guidelines for international arrivals have been revised on 29 December 2022 and from 1 January 2023 all international arrivals from China, Singapore, Hong Kong, Korea, Thailand and Japan will mandatorily undergo pre-departure RT-PCR testing 72 hours prior to travel . At the same time, the Air Suvidha portal has been started with a provision to allow passengers to submit/upload negative RT-PCR test reports as well as submit self-declaration forms.
5 key points
- The surveillance of cases of SARI, ILI and similar diseases has started in the states and a weekly report for this is being sent by the states to the Union Health Ministry.
- Genome sequencing has been scaled up and during December around 500 samples are being genome sequenced by INSACOG labs across the country.
- Pharma companies were asked to closely monitor the global supply chain scenario and ensure adequate stock and availability of all medicines, including COVID medicines.
- As per the instructions, the commerce ministry has been asked to monitor the ongoing export of medicinal products and equipment to China.
- The status of Covid vaccination was reviewed. More than 220 crore doses of Kovid vaccine have been given, out of which 102.56 crore first dose (97%) and 95.13 crore second dose (90%) have been given to the beneficiaries so far.
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