Himachal doing much better in tackling pandemic, recent spike temporary: Health official

Shimla, July 23

Himachal Pradesh is doing much better in handling the COVID-19 pandemic compared to other states, a top health official has claimed, terming the recent spike in its cases "temporary". 

The current situation arising out of the recent spike will stabilise soon, Additional Chief Secretary (Health) RD Dhiman told reporters on Wednesday evening, seeking to assure people that the cases would reduce soon.

Attributing the recent spike in cases to the arrival of migrant workers, a marriage function in Sirmaur district and movement of the central armed police forces (CAPF) after Indo-China clash in Ladakh's Galwan valley, he said the testing rate is higher and death rate lower in the hill state.

The recent positive cases of around 160 migrant workers of industrial town Baddi-Barotiwala-Nalagarh in Solan district, 80 persons of a marriage party at Gobindgarh in Nahan of Sirmaur district and several ITBP and army jawans are isolated ones, he said adding they have nothing to do with the people of the state in general.

The loopholes have been plugged by making quarantine for incoming industrial labourers mandatory a few days ago while the ITBP and Army jawans found positive were already quarantined with their cases having no chance of affecting locals, he added.

Dhiman said the death rate in HP is 0.84 per cent as compared to 2.45 per cent at the national level.

Every case is appropriately monitored and referred to a higher medical facility in case of any complication, he added.

As many as 17,000 persons out of the per million target population have been tested in HP so far compared to 11,000 at the national level, he added.

Thirdly, the positivity rate in Himachal is 1.3 percent which is much less than the norm of below 5 percent set by the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the central government, he added.

In reply to a question, Dhiman said there is no need to restrict people from meeting Chief Minister Jai Ram Thakur once he starts attending office after a week of testing negative again.

 “The chief minister is in public life, people meeting him cannot be restricted. Handling COVID-19 and other activities will go side by side. The only requirement is to maintain social distancing and to adopt cough etiquette to check the spread of the virus,” he added.

Meanwhile, 44 people tested positive for COVID-19 on Thursday in the state, with 42 in Solan alone, said Dhiman on Thursday morning.

With this, the total number of COVID-19 cases in the state has risen to 1,770.

Of them, 630 are active cases, while 1,112 patients have recovered so far, he added.

Eleven patients succumbed to the virus, whereas 15 patients migrated out of the state. PTI