As a row between West Bengal and the Centre over the state’s efforts
to control the coronavirus disease (Covid-19) escalates, officials of
the Union government said on Friday that the region was failing to
conduct adequate tests and grappling with confusion and mismanagement
over identifying hot spots and containing them.
The Centre and the
state government, led by chief minister Mamata Banerjee, have exchanged
allegations over the criteria for reporting deaths from the infection,
and while While Bengal says the Centre is trying to politicise a public
health crisis, the Union government maintains that state officials are
ignoring repeated warnings to step up fight against the disease.
A
Union government official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said
the state was not even conducting 250 tests daily, as mandated by the
Centre for Covid-19 hotspots, while neighbouring Odisha was testing
between 500 to 1,000 people every day.
“The state has 540
identified containment zones and 10 districts are falling in the red
zone. Instead of sharpening focus on these zones, the West Bengal
administration is quibbling over the number of containment areas
alleging that the Centre is overestimating such areas,” another senior
Union official said, asking not to be named.
The Centre holds
daily review meetings with different states on their Covid-19
preparedness. On Thursday, during the meeting with West Bengal, only one
state official was absent, according to a person present at the
meeting.
As district magistrates of the red zones did not attend
the meeting, Union health minister Harsh Vardhan inquired if they would
be joining at all, the person added on condition of anonymity. The lone
West Bengal representative, Saumitra Mohan, MD of the National Health
Mission, said he wasn’t immediately able to contact the DMs.
Even
as the Centre has started running special trains to send back stranded
migrant workers to their states, the West Bengal government has not yet
put in place any standard operating procedures (SOP) for the exercise,
another official said. The issue was raised again on Thursday and Mohan
was asked to convey the urgency for SOP to senior officials in the
state.
The Centre also pointed out that a proper door-to-door
scrutiny in the containment zones was not happening in the state. There
were also reports of lax rules in sealing containment zones in many
areas, especially in the congested areas of north Kolkata.
“We
have told them that it is of vital importance to conduct tests for
Surveillance for Severe Acute Respiratory Infections (SARI)/Influenza
Like Illness (ILI), which should be intensified in unaffected districts
and districts that have not reported cases for the last 14 days,” said a
senior official.
Leaders of the ruling Trinamool Congress in the
state have argued that the Centre failed to send adequate numbers of
Covid-19 testing kits, which resulted in low level of testing. The
Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) maintains that there is no
problem of testing kits’ supply to the state.
An
interministerial central team (IMCT), which visited West Bengal to
assess the Covid-19 situation recently, said there were discrepancies in
reporting of cases in the state. In its final status report submitted
to the West Bengal government, IMCT also raised questions on the state
government’s claim that it surveyed five million people.
A senior
Union official said that due to the lack of cooperation from the state,
the central team was forced to use Google Maps to find their way to
hospitals or other spots for surveillance.
Despite repeated requests for a statement, Mohan did not offer any comment.
Trinamool’s
general secretary Partha Chatterjee, however, has accused the Centre of
politicising issues and warned the Centre against mixing politics with
administration at a critical juncture in the public health crisis.
https://www.hindustantimes.com
Post a Comment
We love to hear from you! What's on your mind?