Rajasthan tests returning migrants | India Today Insight

When Rajasthan chief minister Ashok Gehlot on May 27 inaugurated, by video link, a Covid molecular laboratory at Jaipur’s private-run JNU Hospital, which has 350 out of its 760 beds reserved for coronavirus cases, he indicated that the state needs to gear up for a prolonged battle with the deadly virus. “We cannot afford to relax even when the state is doing better than several others. Experts have warned of more cases in the coming weeks,” Gehlot said. The chief minister reiterated the decision to set up Covid testing labs in all 33 districts, with a capability to conduct 25,000 tests every day. So far, only eight labs have come up, which can perform 16,000 tests daily. The lab at JNU Hospital can do 384 tests at a time, with results delivered within six hours. “We can comfortably do a thousand tests in a day,” says Sandeep Bakshi, owner of JNU Hospital.

Gehlot’s warning not to drop guard, among other reasons, stems from the return of an estimated 1 million migrants to Rajasthan in May. Officials expect another half a million arrivals in the coming weeks. As of May 31, Rajasthan had 8,580 Covid cases, of which 2,719 are active cases. The returning migrants have added 2,458 cases in May. With Bundi reporting a case on May 27, Covid has now spread to all 33 districts of Rajasthan.

State health and family welfare minister Raghu Sharma said 12 green zone districts have been reclassified as red zones because of the arrival of migrants. Jaipur, with 1,909 cases, and Jodhpur, with 1,325 cases, are among India’s 13 worst-affected cities. Udaipur has 523 cases and Kota, Nagaur and Pali more than 400. Jhalawar has added 212 cases in less than three days.

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On the positive side, Rajasthan has had a low Covid death rate of 2.2 per cent; nine out of 10 fatalities had chronic underlying diseases. The number of cases has been doubling every 18 days against the national average of 13. This has given authorities the confidence to shut down Covid wards in a few major hospitals in the state to let doctors focus on patients with other serious ailments as well. “The chief minister wants us to be alert, but there is no reason to panic. Rather, I can foresee the number of active cases stabilising once the returning migrants start recovering,” says Sharma.

Gehlot, however, has asked for a detailed district-wise analysis in order to ramp up Covid care facilities in Rajasthan. At a meeting on May 28, he asked officials to come up with employment schemes for those who had lost jobs and urged people to be considerate towards the jobless and the migrants. He also called for a new social care protocol for senior citizens, a high-risk group. “We must work out new things to keep them motivated, happy and confident,” Gehlot said.

Rajasthan has 12,000 centres for institutional quarantine. Some 21,000 people are admitted there. Another 475,000 people are home-quarantined. The state government has decided to let migrants self-isolate at home and use the quarantine centres only if they show symptoms or are unable to quarantine at home. Some experts have criticised this over-emphasis on home quarantine, given that the state had claimed that over 100,000 beds were lying vacant in the quarantine facilities. “We do not have so many resources to spend on asymptomatic migrants,” explains an official. “We are reserving the resources for symptomatic cases or people found to have been in contact with Covid patients.”

Authorities have been tough with violators of the lockdown. Under the Rajasthan Epidemic Diseases Ordinance, till May 26, 40,083 violators had been fined a total of Rs 81.25 lakh; over 136,000 vehicles had been seized and their owners fined Rs 6.88 crore. Officials fined 24,067 people for not wearing masks in public places, 3,755 shopkeepers for selling goods without wearing masks and 11,872 people for not adhering to physical distancing norms. Around 445 people have been arrested in incidents of attacks on frontline health workers.

However, with more and more markets and paan shops opening with the end of the fourth phase of the lockdown and citizens stepping out to spend time in parks, which are now open for a few hours every morning and evening, social distancing will be a challenge. As Gehlot says, the time to drop the guard has not yet come.

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