Speed Post News Network
New Delhi : Coronavirus (COVID-19) death toll climbed to 603 in India at 5 pm on April 21, 2020, with 13 new deaths being reported since the last update by Union H & FW Ministry the same morning. The number of Coronavirus patients cured/discharged has increased to 3,259 in the country while the number of active cases is 15,122.
Among the States/UTs, Maharashtra has reported 232 Coronavirus deaths followed by MP with 74 deaths and Gujarat 71 deaths. Delhi has reported 47 COVID-19 deaths, Rajasthan 25, Telangana 23, Andhra Pradesh 20, Karnataka and Punjab 16 each, Tamilnadu 17, Uttar Pradesh 18, West Bengal 12, J&K 5, and Kerala & Haryana 3 each. Bihar has reported 2 COVID-19 deaths while Jharkhand has reported 3 deaths due to it. India has so far reported 18,601 confirmed cases of Coronavirus.
Dr Harsh Vardhan, Union Health and Family Welfare Minister, has written to the Health Departments of all States/UTs to ensure adequate availability of blood in blood banks. In particular, for people needing regular blood transfusion with blood disorders such as Thalassemia, Sickle Cell Anaemia, and Hemophilia etc, according to a PIB release.
He has also stated that the online portal ‘e-RaktKosh’ needs to be used for the real-time status monitoring of the current stock of each blood group. As part of the collaborative approach for COVID-19 management, Indian Red Cross has started a 24X7 control room in Delhi for blood services. The numbers are: 011-23359379, 93199 82104, 93199 82105.
The Empowered Committed-4, which is entrusted with Augment Human Resources and capacity Building, has developed the COVID WARRIORS dashboard which contains data for 20 categories (with 49 sub categories) human resources including MBBS doctors, AYUSH doctors, nurses, frontline workers like ASHA, Aanganwaadi workers, healthcare workers trained under various schemes of Government of India like PMKVY, DDU GKY, DAY–NULM, and health volunteers like NCC, NYKS, NSS, Ex-Servicemen.
At present, there is data for more than 1.24 crore human resources on the dashboard and it is continuously being updated with addition of new groups and sub groups as per specialisation. The dashboard contains State and Districtwise information about the number of human resources available from each group, along with the contact details of respective State and District Nodal officers. The platform provides anytime anywhere onsite delivery of training material/modules accessible through any device (mobile/laptop/desktop). The platform has 14 courses with 53 modules with includes 113 videos and 29 documents.
As on date, 14,995 AYUSH professionals have been deployed in 15 States and 2 UTs, whereas 3,492 NCC Cadets and 553 NCC staff have been deployed in 68 districts in 16 States and 3 UTs. More than 47,000 cadets have already enrolled for training and will be available for deployment. Also, 1,80,000 Ex- Servicemen have been identified by the Sainik Boards for deployment. More than 40,000 volunteers from Indian Red Cross are actively participating in COVID 19 related activities in over 550 districts in the country. As many as 27 lakh volunteers of NYKS and NSS volunteers across all States and UTs are working with the civic authorities in COVID 19 related activities.
In view of instances of hospitals getting closed as some healthcare workers became positive and some patients admitted for unrelated disease in non-COVID hospitals becoming positive, the Ministry of Health has issued guidelines to be followed on detection of such cases in a non-COVID Health Facility. The guidelines may be accessed at:
https://www.mohfw.gov.in/pdf/GuidelinestobefollowedondetectionofsuspectorconfirmedCOVID19case.pdf
The Hospitals Infection Control Committee is made responsible for monitoring such issues in the hospitals. The Committee shall ensure that the healthcare workers are oriented on infection prevention and control guidelines.
Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) is launching a randomised, blinded, two arms, active comparator-controlled clinical trial to evaluate drug efficacy to reduce mortality in critically ill COVID-19 patients. Given the similarities between the clinical characteristics of patients suffering from COVID-19 and Gram-negative sepsis, the Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI) has approved the trial and it will soon begin in multiple hospitals.
Four Districts : Mahe (Puducherry), Kodagu (Karnataka), Pauri Garhwal (Uttrakhand), and Pratapgarh (Rajasthan) have not reported any fresh cases during the last 28 days. There are now 61 additional districts from 23 States/UT that have not reported any fresh cases during the last 14 Days. Four new districts have been included in the list: Latur , Osmanabad, Hingoli, and Washim from Maharashtra.