Cabinet Secretary takes stock of Coronavirus situation as cases surge in Andhra, Telangana

New Delhi: A Covid-19 review by the Centre among states with high incidence here on Saturday identified Andhra Pradesh and Telangana as two such states and instructions have been issued for greater coordination between the Centre and the states in containing the same.

Though coordination between the two is said to be good, some states which have in the recent past showed high rise in the daily number of active cases and are emerging as concern areas from Covid management point of view.

As part of Centre-state coordinated strategy for effective containment and management of the Covid-19 pandemic, a high-level virtual review meeting was chaired by Cabinet Secretary with the Chief Secretaries and Health Secretaries of the nine states that are driving the present spurt of the active caseload in the country.

The nine states that participated in the virtual conference include Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Telangana, Odisha, West Bengal, Assam, Karnataka, Jharkhand and Uttar Pradesh.

Cabinet Secretary had a detailed review on the State-specific COVID response strategy with the Health Secretaries and other State officials as well as on the factors that were leading to rising case-load in these States in recent times. In keeping with the 'Test-Track-Treat' strategy, the states were advised to ramp up the testing with special focus on containment zones. Areas of concern with respect to low testing in certain states was highlighted. It was reiterated that sustained and aggressive testing is crucial for early identification of cases and to prevent the spread of infection.

Cabinet Secretary stressed the need for prompt and proper delineation of containment zones as per the guidelines of the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, among others.