Ensure no congregation takes place with more than 25 people: Lt Governor to DCs, SsP

Srinagar, Aug 6: Lieutenant Governor, Manoj Sinha Friday chaired the weekly meetings with members of Covid Task Force, Deputy Commissioners, and SsPs on present Covid scenario in the UT.
“Next 100 days are crucial as per the experts’ report. We need to be alert, vigilant and must adhere to Covid protocols to prevent the third wave”, observed the Lt Governor.
Emphasizing on reaching out to the maximum population to make them aware about the Covid related SoPs, the Lt Governor directed the Health and Information departments to come up with a comprehensive district-level plan for conducting IEC campaigns. Divisional Commissioners will monitor the implementation of awareness activities in their respective divisions, he added.
He further asked the DCs and SsPs to rope in religious leaders and community heads for spreading awareness regarding adherence of Covid Appropriate Behaviour, besides making informative announcements from religious places to create a sense of responsibility on the part of the general public to follow covid protocols and control the spread of the infection.
The Lt Governor laid special emphasis on mobilizing the joint teams for effective enforcement on the ground and taking long-term solutions to mitigate the spread of Corona virus. Directions were passed to the DCs, SsP to ensure that no congregation takes place with more than 25 people.
On being informed that as many as 5,62,000 vaccine doses are available with J&K, the Lt Governor observed that availability of vaccines in such large numbers will go a long way in complementing the government’s efforts to achieve the set target of covering 60% of our population by this month.
Dedicated focus must be given on timely inoculation of 2nd dose, besides ensuring 100% coverage of the 18-44 age group with the first dose, the Lt Governor told the officials.
While assessing the surveillance activities being conducted in the districts, the Lt Governor directed the district administrations to scale up the surveillance exercises. Contact tracing must be done at a 1:15 ratio to break the spread chain of the virus, he added.
The Lt Governor passed specific directions for uploading of all covid related data at the earliest, besides increasing testing and awareness activities in areas with high positivity rates.
While taking a district-wise thorough assessment, the Lt Governor sought the present standings of the districts in respect of various indicators and norms set for evaluating the Covid situation from Additional Chief Secretary, Health and Medical Education Department, Sh. Atal Dulloo, who in turn briefed the chair about the analysis of Covid-19 pandemic including the status of vaccine availability and coverage; real time reproductive number of cases ( Rt value); availability of vaccine; positivity rate; daily trends of COVID 19 cases & testing done etc.
He informed that more than 51 lakh population has been inoculated with 1st dose till date. It was further informed that the remaining districts viz Kupwara, Srinagar, Doda, Kathua, Reasi, and Udhampur which were yet to achieve saturation of 1st dose in 45 and above age group are also nearing the 100% coverage.
The Lt Governor also sought the status of the covid containment efforts of the Administration, besides the measures taken to vaccinate the targeted population under different age-groups and other interventions made to effectively tackle the spread of the corona virus.
Rajeev Rai Bhatnagar, Advisor to Lt Governor; Dr. Arun Kumar Mehta, Chief Secretary; Dilbag Singh, DGP; Shaleen Kabra, Principal Secretary to the Government, Home Department; Nitishwar Kumar, Principal Secretary to the Lt Governor; Mukesh Singh, ADGP; Pandurang K Pole, Divisional Commissioner, Kashmir; Vijay Kumar, IGP Kashmir; Dr. Raghav Langer, Divisional Commissioner Jammu; Deputy Commissioners and SsP attended the meetings, in person and through virtual mode.