Samples of 10 goats tested for coronavirus in Karnataka return negative

Coronavirus

The animals were tested after the goatherd tested positive for coronavirus last week.

TNM Staff

Several goats, who were quarantined and tested after their goatherd was found to be infected with coronavirus, have tested negative for the virus. The news comes as a relief to farmers in Godekere village in Tumakuru district which neighbours Bengaluru. The negative results of ten goats who were tested were announced on Saturday. The results of five other samples tested are awaited.  The residents of the village in Chikkanayakanahalli taluk in Tumakuru had panicked after four goats reportedly died at the farm. An official in the animal husbandry department of the district said that few goats had developed respiratory problems. The goats were subsequently quarantined. "The goat-herd tended to 40-50 goats. Among them, some goats showed symptoms of a disease. Even the goats in a neighboring shed showed some symptoms. District administration issued a notice to go to the spot and conduct virology tests in the laboratory," KG Nandeesh, Deputy Director of the Veterinary Department in Tumakuru. The residents of the village sought the help of Karnataka Law and Parliamentary Affairs Minister JC Madhuswamy as he is the district-in-charge minister in Tumakuru.  The minister, in turn, directed the animal husbandry department to probe the matter. Department officials collected tissues and swab samples of the goat on July 1. The Southern Regional Disease Diagnostic Laboratory under the Institute of Animal Health and Veterinary Biologicals, a government-run institute, processed ten samples collected. Five other samples were sent to a lab in Bhopal, Nandeesh said. The swab samples of goats belonging to Shantha Kumar and Mangalamma from Godakere village were collected. The samples were subjected to a SARS-CoV-2 polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test. "Goat samples tested for COVID-19 were found negative by real-time PCR," Dr Sanjeev Kumar M, Assistant Professor at the laboratory stated. Animals testing positive for the novel coronavirus is not unheard of. The United States Centre for Disease Control (CDC) reported that a tiger in a zoo in New York had tested positive for the virus. The CDC said that the virus can be transmitted to “cats, dogs, and a few other types of animals” and in the US, they became sick after having come in contact with infected people.

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Bengaluru citizens’ group urges Railways to use idle resources to run suburban services

Transport

With long-distance travel reduced resulting in idle resources, Citizens for Citizens suggested intra-city rail services can be introduced to ease Bengaluru’s congestion woes.

Soumya Chatterjee

With the approval of a dedicated suburban rail project for Bengaluru like those in Mumbai and Chennai overdue for decades, a city group has approached Indian Railways to run some services on existing infrastructure. The group Citizens for Citizens (C4C) has proposed that since much of the rail infrastructure is lying idle due to the ongoing COVID-19 crisis, the same can be optimally used to increase revenues for the Railways and also help Bengaluru with its congestion. One of the only gains of the lockdown was the improved air quality in Bengaluru, which had dropped to normal levels with the decreased usage of public transport. C4C through its convenor Rajkumar Dugar recently submitted a petition to this effect to the Divisional Railway Manager, South Western Railways, Bengaluru Division, Ashok Kumar Verma. A copy of the same has been sent to Union Railways Minister Piyush Goyal as well.   Speaking to TNM, Rajkumar Dugar said, “I was speaking to the staff of High Grounds Traffic Police and they said that with less public transport, the congestion levels are again almost back to normal. In trains, physical distancing is possible to a greater degree compared to buses. And they can prove to be cheaper and faster. Post COVID-19, the railway infrastructure is not being used as it was before, and the same is truer for long distance routes, so a lot of resources are lying idle. With this there is a problem of revenue reduction and that will remain for some time now. So what we propose is a win-win solution wherein you can run local trains within 100-km radius of Bengaluru.”   He added, “With this, we will not only reduce congestion and pollution in the city but the Railways also can generate some revenue. Even if the dedicated project gets approved now, the best case scenario will mean that the services can only start by 2026. There is huge demand for these services.”   In the petition, the group noted that five routes, if operated in a loop, will prove beneficial to not only city residents for their daily commute and help ease congestion but also help those living in nearby towns who come regularly to the city for their livelihoods.   “1. Tumakuru – Hosur, 2. Ramanagaram – Bangarpet, 3. Cantonment – Devanahalli (will double up as Airport Train as soon as Airport Halt Station is soon ready), 4. Majestic to Yelahanka via Byappanahalli, and 5. Yelahanka to Majestic via Yesvantpur. The last two should complement each other to form a Ring Railway Service,” the petition said. The petition further said that the exact starting and ending stations and timings should be worked out based on all relevant factors that are known to the Railways. These will help Bengaluru by reducing traffic congestion and pollution too, while making local travel easy, comfortable and economic for people living in and around Bengaluru, while also helping the Railways use the infrastructure better, the letter read.

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Karnataka labs can now inform patients about COVID-19 test results

Coronavirus

The notification also mentioned that the labs could now go ahead and provide test results to the individual who has been tested.

TNM Staff

Representational image/PTI

The Karnataka government's Directorate of Health, has withdrawn its notification regarding COVID testing in government and private sector laboratories, on July 4. This means that now, the private labs can tell the result of a COVID test to the patient, and need not send in the testing information to the district administration. However, they needed to continue uploading the information on the ICMR portal, the withdrawal notice said. The withdrawal added that “However all Government and Private Laboratories should upload the details of COVID positive and negative cases in the ICMR portal daily as mentioned in point (2) of 2nd para.” The government in its previous order said that labs cannot convey result status to the individual. It had however said that results need to be uploaded in the ICMR Portal daily and should be submitted to the concerned District Surveillance Officers, COVID Surveillance officer, BBMP, Bengaluru & State Surveillance Unit, Bengaluru. Copies of the withdrawal were sent to all officials and laboratories in the state which are undertaking COVID testing. In view of evolving COVID 19 pandemic situation in the State, laboratory capacity has been expanded to more than 75 laboratories in both Public and Private sector. Karnataka on Saturday evening reported that 17,592 samples were tested in the state, and 1,839 samples tested positive. Thus far, 21,549 cases of coronavirus have been reported in the state.

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Dial 1912 if a Bengaluru hospital denies bed for COVID-19 patient

Coronavirus

The Karnataka government on Saturday established a bed allocation system for COVID-19 patients in Bengaluru.

TNM Staff

PTI : Image for representation

The Karnataka government on Saturday established a bed allocation system for COVID-19 patients in Bengaluru. The announcement of the system comes after multiple reports of patients struggling to find hospital beds in the city. Anyone who needs a bed should dial 108 for ambulance service and 1912 if admission is denied by a hospital. This applies to COVID-19 patients or patients with symptoms of Severe Acute Respiratory Infection (SARI) "Persons with breathlessness may call the 108 services, which will ascertain if the person is COVID positive or a suspect, and arrange for an Advanced Life Support (ALS) ambulance to a nearby treatment facility in consultation with the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike’s (BBMP) bed allocation team. If the person has not undergone a COVID-19 test, but has breathlessness, asthma or influenza-like illness (ILI), he/she will be shifted immediately to a COVID-19 hospital and tested compulsorily," stated a press release issued by the Karnataka government. "If the patient is positive for coronavirus, he/she will be shifted from the isolation ward to the COVID-19 section of the hospital. If negative, he/she will be shifted to the non-COVID section and treated. If an asymptomatic COVID-19 patient with no underlying medical condition calls 108, it will be transferred to BBMP’s bed allocation team for necessary transportation and bed allocation," added the release. Additionally, the state government has also started the 24x7 1912 BESCOM (Bangalore Electricity Supply Company) call centre to address issues of hospitals denying treatment to people. The BBMP's bed allocation team will have real-time software that updates the availability of beds, and will be linked to 108 and 1912. The team will get the list of COVID-19 patients from the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) portal in real-time and send paramedics to patients’ residences after contacting them. This comes after a series of complaints from Bengaluru residents that hospitals were denying admissions to COVID-19 patients and other persons with breathlessness. A few private hospitals mentioned in the first list of COVID-19 hospitals in Karnataka on June 20 were not admitting COVID-19 patients and were unaware about their hospitals being listed. Read: Turned away by 18 hospitals in Bengaluru, 52-year-old man with breathlessness dies

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1,172 patients test positive for coronavirus in Bengaluru

Coronavirus

The BBMP is still in the process of tracing the contacts of the 1,172 persons who tested positive on Saturday.

Theja Ram

PTI/Representative image

Karnataka reported the highest number of COVID-19 cases on Saturday with 1,839 persons testing positive in a single day taking the state's total of the number of active people with the illness to 11,966. Of this, 1,172 persons, who tested positive for the coronavirus were from Bengaluru Urban district. The city reported the highest number of cases in a single day on Saturday. The other districts with relatively higher cases on Saturday include Dakshina Kannada (75), Ballari (73), Bidar (51), Dharwad (45), Raichuru (41), Mysuru (38), Kalaburagi (37) and Vijayapura (37). The Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) is still in the process of tracing the contacts of all the 1,172 persons who tested positive on Saturday. With this, the total number of active cases in Bengaluru is 7,250. In addition, 143 patients were discharged on Saturday across the state with 129 of them from Bengaluru City. The state reported 42 deaths on Saturday alone — 22 of the total number of deaths were patients from Bengaluru. The other deaths occurred in various districts, with six deaths in Bidar, three in Kalaburagi, four in Dakshina Kannada, two in Dharwad, one each in Hassan and Bengaluru Rural. Two of the 42 people who died were asymptomatic and one person died in a road accident in Bidar, after which the 31-year-old man tested positive for the novel coronavirus. The rest had comorbidities and were also patients with either Influenza-Like Illness (ILI) or Severe Acute respiratory Infection (SARI). As of Saturday, 226 patients in the state were lodged in Intensive Care Units (ICUs). Of these, 124 persons are in Bengaluru, 14 in Dharwad, 10 each in Kalaburagi and Ballari, seven in Mysuru, six each in Hassan, Bidar and Dakshina Kannada, five each in Raichur, Gadag and Shivamogga, four each in Udupi, Kolar, Davangere and Tumakuru, three in Bagalakote, two each in Belagavi, Kodagu, Chamarajanagara and Mandya, and one in Uttara Kannada.

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Karnataka to launch app for COVID-19 patients to find available hospital beds

Coronavirus

The BBMP War Room and the state war room are in the process of gathering data for the app, which will be ready to roll out by July 6.

TNM Staff

Representation photo

Over the last week, two incidents were reported in Bengaluru, where COVID-19 patients died before they were able to get treatment, as many private hospitals turned them away. With patients struggling to find hospital beds, the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike is slated to release an application, which can be used to identify the areas where the patients are located, and by patients to identify available beds in hospitals and nearby care centres.  Speaking to TNM, head of the BBMP's War Room, Hepshiba, said that over the last four days, the BBMP has been in the process of executing plans to implement the new system of identification. "Over the last three to four days, we were in the process of getting all the updates from hospitals to implement the plan. We have an index application to make process flow simple," she said. Index is a type of database that the app is based on. "Whatever new scenario arises, we want to be able to identify the problem and tools available to ensure smooth implementation. We are developing an application based on AI (artificial intelligence) for this," Hepshiba added.   The new AI-based application will be able to detect the zone where a patient with COVID-19 resides, and once the patient enters their details, ascertain whether the patient should go to a COVID-19 hospital – including private hospitals – or a COVID-19 Care Centre. "The BBMP Commissioner has also directed all zonal-level officers to set up call centres for COVID-19 patients. The call centre will be monitored by the BBMP War Room. These call centres will be able to identify the areas, ward, street and direct people to the necessary hospital or COVID-19 Care Centre. In the application, people will be able to enter their details and also call the zonal call centres for queries," Hepshiba said.  The BBMP plans to launch this application by July 6, she added.  Further, the Karnataka State War Room is also in the process of rolling out a mobile application for patients in other districts to track and find hospital beds. “It will be like a cab service app, where people can have access to ambulances to get to a hospital, and to book a hospital bed,” a senior Health Department official said. The tentative launch is set for July 6 or later next week. The app will verify the list of COVID-19 patients with ICMR’s database of persons with COVID-19 and allocate beds accordingly, the official added.  “We have the information about all hospitals, ambulances and the database of patients. This will be a primary database along with call centres. There will be real-time allocation of beds in various facilities. People will also be able to find hospitals on the app. They will have both options of calling the centre and using the app,” the senior official said. 

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32 Karnataka students who wrote SSLC exams test positive for coronavirus

Education

SSLC exams were held between June 25 and July 3.

TNM Staff

File photo

Fourteen students in Karnataka, who sat for the SSLC exam have tested positive for the novel coronavirus on Friday. As per a press release from the Karnataka government, a total number of 32 SSLC students, who took exams between June 25 and July 3 have tested positive for the coronavirus. Eighty other students are in home quarantine. As of July 3, more than 7.60 lakh students wrote the exam, with 14,745 absentees. The report from the government stated that 3,911 students did not attend the exams as they were in a containment zone. A total of 863 students had not attended the exams as they were unwell. Last week, a Class 10 student from Hassan had tested coronavirus positive. The student reportedly wrote an exam on June 25, despite having taken the coronavirus test. His positive result reportedly came shortly after he finished writing the exam. The SSLC exams which were earlier scheduled between March 27 and April 9 were postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. In May, the Karnataka government announced that the exams will be held between June 25 and July 3. The government had added that hand sanitisers will be provided to everyone in the examination hall and classrooms will be sanitized every day.  Temperature checks will also be done for everyone entering the exam hall by the health department, the government had said. The Karnataka Education Department had also allowed students from containment zones and those with COVID-19 symptoms in the state to write their SSLC exams in a separate room from other students. Students who had gone back to their hometowns due to the lockdown were allowed to take their exams from the closest centre.  

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