Chennai, Feb 16 (BPNS)

The Tamil Nadu Public Health department will undertake testing of people at all crowded places including bus stations, railway stations, markets, and even beaches for Covid -19. This is a shift from the earlier guidelines issued by the Department of Public Health (DPH) to test contacts of positive people who have symptoms or those above 60 years of age even without symptoms or comorbidities.

The Tamil Nadu health secretary,J. Radhakrishnan in a statement on Wednesday said that all symptomatic people, contacts of people who have tested positive, all those with influenza-like illness and severe acute respiratory infections, and people with breathing difficulties admitted to non- Covid wards in hospitals will be tested for Covid -19 other than the tests being conducted at crowded places.

Pregnant mothers, immunocompromised individuals, and differently-abled people are eligible for testing irrespective of their symptoms or comorbidities.

The state health secretary also said that facilities used as Covid care centres will now be handed over to the concerned authorities step by step and a review on this will be conducted in the next fifteen days.

However, he said that the health department would take this decision only after consultation with the Chief Minister.

The statement also said that 91 percent of having received their first dose of vaccine and around 71 percent have received their second vaccine. Even after this around 1.13 crore, people are yet to take the second dose of vaccine in Tamil Nadu.

Interestingly 45 lakh people in the age group of 18-44 and above 60 are also to take vaccine in Tamil Nadu while in the 15-18 age group, 81 percent has taken the first dose of the vaccine.