Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday told chief ministers to focus on COVID19 containment measures – testing, tracing, isolation and quarantine – in the next few weeks with a common goal to ensure minimum loss of life, and pitched for formulating a “staggered” exit strategy from the ongoing lockdown.
As the country witnessed a spike in coronavirus infectionsand deaths in the past few days, the prime minister held a meeting with chiefministers via video-conferencing, and said it was imperative to work on warfooting, identify hotspots, encircle them and ensure that coronavirus does notspread out. According to an official statement, Modi also pitched forformulating a common exit strategy to ensure “staggered re-emergence ofthe population” once the 21-day nationwide lockdown ends on April 14.
Reiterating the importance of social distancing inpreventing the spread of the virus, which has infected over 1,950 people andcaused at least 50 deaths, Modi asked the states to brainstorm and sendsuggestions on the lockdown exit strategy. “The prime minister outlinedthat the common goal for the country is to ensure minimum loss of life. In thenext few weeks, testing, tracing, isolation and quarantine should remain the areasof focus,” the statement said.
The states spoke about the importance of mobilisingresources, financial as well as medical, to mitigate the crisis, the statementsaid.
Union Health Secretary Preeti Sudan spoke about the rise innumber of cases in India, spread of cases from the Nizamuddin headquarters ofTablighi Jamaat, preparations to tackle medical cases arising out of furtherspread of the virus, and need to break the transmission chain in the districtswith high number of confirmed cases.
During the interaction, the prime minister forewarned thatthe global situation remains far from satisfactory.
He informed the participants about speculations of a”possible second wave” of spread of the virus in some countries.
He highlighted the necessity of maintaining supply ofessential medical products, availability of raw material for manufacture ofmedicines and medical equipment.
Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and Home Minister Amit Shahwere also present at the interaction.