Entire Population of Rajasthan Town to be Screened as Private Hospital Becomes Coronavirus Hotbed

Jaipur: Bhilwara, nearly 250 km from Jaipur, has become the epicentre of Rajasthan's coronavirus scare with 14 out of 28 cases in the state reported from a private hospital in the city.

Last week, three doctors and three nurses at the hospital tested positive for COVID-19. The Rajasthan government has put the state under lockdown.

The state's medical team is yet to find the source of infection in the first case. Officials, however, suspect that some guests from Saudi Arabia were staying at the residence of one of the doctors.

Meanwhile, state health minister Raghu Sharma said that community transmission has started in Bhilwara and Jhunjhunu.

The authorities have planned to screen 75,000 houses in the city and beds will be reserved for isolation facilities in private hospitals, hotels, hostels and in private houses, they said.

In a report by BBC, Bhilwara MLA Vitthal Shankar Avasthi said that over 600 patients were admitted to the hospital where the positive cases were found and the doctors had checked more than 5,500 people. “We have prepared a list of people who had been examined at the hospital,” Avasthi said.

“Twenty-six people suspected of having contracted the infection have been put under isolation and the hospital has been sealed.”

The government has said that it will screen the city’s entire population of 4.5 lakh. “We have 300 medical teams that are going door-to-door to screen people,” Rohit Kumar Singh, Additional Chief Secretary of Rajasthan Health Department, told BBC. “We will screen all the residents of Bhilwara and those in the neighbouring towns and villages.”

Several states across India have been put under lockdown as the government scrambles to contain the rapidly-spreading coronavirus, which has infected 433 people and killed seven. Gujarat, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Punjab, Ladakh, Chandigarh, Chhattisgarh, Himachal Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Odisha, Puducherry and Uttarakhand are among the states where only essential services will be allowed to operate.

Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot on Monday ordered officials to prepare 1 lakh isolation beds across the state. “There is nothing bigger than saving lives and for this, the government will ensure all possible measures by taking all into confidence,” he said.