COVID going to tier 2, 3 cities, rural docs must be trained: AIIMS chief

Aditi Tandon
Tribune News Service
New Delhi, April 30

AIIMS New Delhi chief Randeep Guleria on Friday said COVID 19 was now entering tier 2 and 3 cities and it had become essential to train even village doctors in handling the disease.

The government on Friday tasked 14 regional centres of excellence including AIIMS New Delhi, PGI Chandigarh, JIPMER Puducherry and AIIMS Bhubaneshwar and Bhopal to conduct training of government and private doctors across smaller towns and even villages in the management of COVID, a new disease.

The Centre also issued guidelines on the management of COVID in children with more and more infections being seen in those under 18 years.

Guleria also said it was crucial to reduce cases and appealed to people to launch “break the chain movement” by gifting masks to those who are not complying and also by preventing crowding.

Health infrastructure can work to a limit but is cases continue to rise like this, the situation will become very challenging, the AIIMS chief warned.

He said the second wave's rate of rise has been too rapid for the health infrastructure to cope and doubling rate of cases has reduced drastically.

“Going forward, proper management of COVID is key. The pandemic is going to tier 2, 3 cities. Training of doctors is needed to handle the new disease. The Ministry has formed 14 regional centres of excellence at 14 locations to conduct mentoring of doctors in COVID training so that everyone is ready to manage the infection when it strikes,” Guleria said today.

He asked everyone to avoid misuse of drugs after Health Ministry joint secretary Lav Agarwal revealed evidence of a hospital found administering plasma, tocilizumab and Remdesivir simultaneously to a patient potentially endangering his life.

“People think Remdesivir and steroids will help. These are not needed.  COVID 19 has two phases – the first is when the virus spreads in the body causing fever and congestion. Sometimes when it spreads to lungs, oxygen falls and anti viral drugs are given. The second phase is when the immune system fails, and body inflames. That is when steroids are needed. If given early, steroids can promote viral replication which is already on in the first phase. Regional Centres of Excellence will train even rural doctors in COVID management,” said Guleria.