See how this district stayed corona-free although surrounded by hotspots

Mysuru: It’s a district in Karnataka that is surrounded by coronavirus hotspots. It shares a border with two of the hottest hotspots in Karnataka: Nanjangud and Malavalli.

And then, it has Tamil Nadu, which is in the throes of mighty corona combat, on one side; on the other, it has Kerala, where the coronavirus first reared its head in the country.

Yet, Chamarajnagar has remained a corona-free district to this day, a green island amid a sea of red.

Last Saturday, the district administration hosted a unique program at the Jaibhuvaneswari circle in Chamarajnagar, offering flowers to honour all of its corona warriors: Aasha, anganwadi and healthcare workers, policemen and the paurakarmikas (sanitation staff).

Sure, the nationwide lockdown applies to Chamarajnagar too. There are public checks and there is sanitisation of streets and public spaces.

So far, the administration has tested over 363 people including 43 people who returned from foreign countries, 52 employees of Jubilant pharma company in Nanjangud which hosts Karnataka’s biggest cluster of corona cases.

In addition, no less than 107 persons from Chamarajnagar had attended the Tablighi Jamaat congregation at Nizamuddin March 13-15. They were all tested. All the results returned negative.

And all of the suspect cases were quarantined at the district quarantine facility. All have completed their quarantine and gone home.

The reports of a few samples of people with influenza-like illness (ILI) are awaited.

The Chamarajnagar administration woke up to the coronavirus situation as early as January 30, when Kerala reported the country’s first COVID-19 positive case.

Chamarajnagar deputy commisisoner M R Ravi ordered precautionary measures put in place the very next day. “We started screening people in vehicles entering the district at six interstate checkposts including two bordering Kerala and three bordering Tamil Nadu, and one that is common to both states.”

With Kerala and Tamil Nadu depending on Karnataka for fruits and vegetables, there is a lot of cargo truck traffic coming and going through these check points. So every empty truck returning from across the border was sanitized, using fire and emergency vehicles.

When the first positive case was reported from the Jubilant Generics drug factory at Nanjangud, and later Malavalli started reporting positive cases due to the returning Tablighi Jamaatis, all interdistrict checkposts were subjected to thorough treatment, even before the nationwide lockdown made it mandatory.

“Once the lockdown was implemented, we sealed all 12 checkposts strictly,” said Ravi. “We installed CCTV cameras at checkposts, and cracked down hard on staff and policemen when they allowed in 595 people from Mangaluru.”

Ravi added, “We became the first district in Karnataka to shift all suspects from home quarantine to institutional quarantine facilities. This was to ensure that the virus does not break out into the general population. This was also to spare the suspect from ostracism when they were quarantined at home. In the institutional facilities, our doctors and faculty from the district medical college could completely focus on thse cases. We fixed up TVs, indoor games and libraries at these quarantined facilities.”

An army of Anganvadi (1426) and Asha workers (796) carried out house-to-house screening of 10.5 lakh people. In the process, they covered 1.28 senior citizens above 60 years, 1.32 lakh children below 10 years, 8666 people from vulnerable group including pregnant women, HIVpositives, tuberculosis patients, etc.

“It was a totally new scenario for us. No one had ever seen an epidemic before. None of us were trained for it,” Ravi said.

The deputy commissioner himself has self-isolated himself and has not been able visit his 76-year-old mother who has suffered multiple organ failure and is bed-ridden in Mysuru.

“It was on March 9 that I last saw my mother after she was discharged from hospital. My relatives are taking care of her Ravi said.