Fri. Mar 29th, 2024
Supreme Court of IndiaThe Hindu

Synopsis: The Central Government claimed, the Delhi Government did not take measures to increase testing capability or plan appropriate ICU beds to deal with the surge in Covid cases.

In spite of being aware that the confluence of winter, festival season and pollution would lead to a rise in Covid cases, the Arvind Kejriwal led Delhi government did not take effective measures to contain Covid-19 infection, the Central Government told the Supreme Court on Thursday.

The Central Government alleged in an affidavit filed before the court that a high-power Central Government committee had recommended that Delhi State prepared for a surge of 15,000 cases every day and thus prepare beds for the Intensive Care Unit (ICU), but the Delhi government did not carry out any timely measures.

The affidavit claimed that while there were daily advertisements on Delhi government achievements, including dengue prevention and control, there were no advertisements on appropriate COVID measures to be seen. The people, in particular, were also not informed about this through routine outreach measures.

The Delhi Government did not take steps to improve testing capability, particularly for RT-PCR, which remained static for a long time at around 20,000 RT-PCR tests.

It was further argued that containment steps, including house-to-house surveillance, contact tracing, isolation and clinical management, as recommended by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW), were also not done properly, contributing to the spread of infection.

The affidavit claimed that there was no adequate tracing of patients who were under home isolation or their contact was also not effectively traced.

The Centre’s reply came in the Supreme Court’s suo motu case on the care of Covid-19 patients and the handling of Covid victims’ dead bodies.

In its affidavit, the centre also elaborated on the steps taken by it to address the pandemic. Sone of these steps were inter-sectoral coordination, travel advice and Covid-19 guidance, laboratory support, hospital facilities, neighbourhood security and surveillance at airports, seaports and land border crossings, etc.

The S&T Core Group on COVID-19 was directly sent to the Principal Scientific Advisor to the Government of India with regard to the production of vaccines.

On 7 August 2020, a National Expert Group on the Administration of Vaccines for COVID-19 was set up under Member (Health) NITI Ayog, which works round the clock to ensure that vaccines are developed and introduced for public administration at the earliest and most affordable price, it added.

The affidavit also claimed that almost 77 percent of active Covid-19 cases in the country are contributed by 10 States. These are: Maharashtra (18.9%), Kerala (14.7%), Delhi (8.5%), West Bengal (5.7%), Karnataka (5.6%), Uttar Pradesh (5.4%), Rajasthan (5.5%), Chhattisgarh (5.0%), Haryana (4.7%) and Andhra Pradesh (3.1%).

The case, which was taken up for a hearing on Friday, was adjourned for Tuesday next week after the Supreme Court noted that States were not enforcing on the ground the steps laid down by the Centre.