Assam Governor Prof Jagdish Mukhi while taking stock of the COVID 19 situation in the State on Wednesday, advised the Health department to effectively implement ‘contact tracing’ to arrest the rise of novel coronavirus infection in the State.
Reviewing the mitigation measures adopted and led by the Health and Family Welfare department in close coordination with other line departments of the State, the Governor said with the detection of two more positive cases, one each in Goalpara and Kokrajhar district, concerted efforts should be made to aggressively implement contact tracing to arrest the chain of transmission.
Prof Mukhi said, “Since the State is allowed to have eased restrictions since May 5 and an anticipated further relaxation to strengthen its sluggish economy in days to come, an asymptomatic positive persons may spread the infection to several others before he or she being detected as COVID positive.”
“So, we need to aggressively implement contract tracing to halt further progression of the dreaded virus and break the chain of transmission,” he added.
The Governor, however, hailed timely actions of the Health and Family Welfare department along with other line departments for their clinical approach in dealing with the COVID-19 situation which have enabled the State to curb the rate of progression.
He also said that taking into consideration of the COVID-19 situation across the country where the spike of the virus has been quite steep in the last couple of days, Assam has to remain pretty alert to reverse the spurt of positive cases in the State.
He, therefore, asked the chief secretary, director general of police, principal secretary, Health and Family Welfare and other senior officers of different line departments to sustain their series of good works in the next few months to keep the virus at bay.
He also maintained that the situation of Assam in the next 14 days or more will be very crucial in the face of eased restrictions.
“It is time, surveillance of the government will become paramount important. Our response of mitigation adopted during the lockdown period will have to be replicated and actively exercised during the present times also to track every potential infection and its likely outbreak”, the Governor advocated.
Prof Mukhi also observed that in spite of the best efforts of the scientific community across the globe, since no vaccination has been developed as of now, social distancing remains the one and only protective tool to keep the virus away.
He, therefore, emphasized on the need to strict enforcement of social distancing norms in letter and spirit.
During the meeting, the Governor also directed that every department to follow the advisories set by the government to add teeth to the administrative mechanism to win over the virus and save the humanity from this perpetual threat.