As COVID-19 cases surge, Delhi govt strengthens surveillance system at district-level

Amid spurt in coronavirus cases in the national capital, the Delhi government has begun work on strengthening surveillance system at district-level and defined responsibilities for dedicated nodal officers.

Authorities said a detailed mechanism will be universally followed to augment the capabilities of the deliverables of the district surveillance units.

Delhi has 11 districts, including North Delhi, South Delhi, West Delhi and Central Delhi.

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Barring June 1, when it saw a spike of 990 cases, Delhi has been recording over 1,000 fresh cases everyday from May 28 to June 6, the highest being 1,513 on June 3.

The city recorded 1,320 fresh coronavirus cases on Saturday, taking the tally to over 27,000-mark, and the death toll due to the disease mounted to 761, the authorities said.

In an order issued on June 4 by the Directorate General of Health Service of Delhi, it said that in view of the spike in COVID-19 cases on a daily basis, a large number of related activities being undertaken across the districts "need to be strengthened" by instituting a system.

And to augment the capacity of the deliverables of the district surveillance units a defined mechanism will be "universally followed", it said.

Read: Social distancing to be 'mantra' as places of worship open for public in Karnataka on June 8

The districts are required to "follow-up all the laboratory confirmed positive cases of COVID-19 through the continuum of care till the outcome of the patients", the order also said.

Defining key functions and responsibilities of dedicated nodal officers, the authorities said at district surveillance officer-level, the DSO will ensure that all positive cases of the district which are available on the ICMR portal shall be owned up and those which do not belong to the district will be intimated for transfer to the ICMR via email with a copy to the state surveillance unit, the order said.

Similarly, all the cases of deaths in a district will be "duly line listed" and shared with the state surveillance unit to facilitate reconciliation of deaths reported at hospitals, either by patients being brought dead or dying at hospitals.

The Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) also said the number of healthcare workers getting infected with COVID-19 is "also on the rise". And the line listing of such positive cases are also to be maintained at the district-level and to be shared with state surveillance unit (SSU) on a daily basis for reconciliation of data, it said.

Several hundreds of healthcare workers in Delhi have tested for COVID-19 till date.

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As cases continue to surge, heads of the Delhi government hospitals have been directed by the city government to procure and stock "sufficient supplies" of medical equipment for "at least the next three months", including, personal protection equipment (PPE) kits, oxygen masks, surgical consumables and gloves.

For nodal officers at home isolation, they have to ensure that district health teams are deployed to assess the feasibility of home isolation for laboratory confirmed cases of COVID-19 reported for the day, officials said.

The nodal officer for transfer of patient coming in ambulance will triage patients according to their symptoms, and facilitate shifting of these patients to appropriate COVID care centre for admission.

The order also specifies the assigned task for nodal officers for the containment zones.

The number of containment zones in the city on Saturday rose to 169, from 154 on Friday.

Read: Coronavirus India update: State-wise total number of confirmed cases, deaths on June 7

The nodal officer for the containment zone shall share daily survey report with the district authorities and the SSU, officials said.

This nodal officer shall also ensure that sanitisation of home of COVID-19 positive patients are carried out by local bodies, and collection and appropriate segregation of biomedical waste from residence of home isolation patients.

The total number of COVID-19 positive patients under home isolation stands at 11,267, the Delhi Health Department said on Saturday.

Similarly, key responsibilities have been assigned for nodal officers for contact tracing and those for data management, the order said.

The nodal officer for lab testing shall ensure that collection centres download the RT-PCR app and the mandatory fields of address and phone number are filled correctly, it said.

Daily reporting of lab tests and results should be intimated to the SSU of Delhi, the order said.