NE NEWS SERVICE
AMARAVATI, APRIL 23
Andhra Pradesh government has adopted a four-pronged strategy of tracing, testing, treatment, and lockdown to contain the spread and intensity of COVID-19 during the past one month, said Chief Minister Jagan Mohan Reddy here on Thursday.
Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy has been constantly monitoring the situation and pressing official machinery into action and has been taking effective steps to ensure food for the poor and movement of agricultural and aqua produce with farmers getting MSP and rabi crop being purchased directly avoiding middlemen.
The State stood first in conducting the maximum number of tests per million in the country and has acquired in required number the equipment, from testing kits to labs and PPEs (Personal Protection Equipment), ventilators, quarantine facilities dedicated COVID-19 hospitals and an extensive social delivery system in the form of village volunteers.
Till April 23 morning, 48,034 tests were conducted averaging to 961 tests per million population and the State is trying to scale up the capacity to 17,500 tests per day. Nine labs have been set up in the past four weeks.
Andhra Pradesh is the only State to conduct three-time comprehensive family survey and identified 32,792 members with symptoms. With five COVID special hospitals, 78 district-level hospitals, 1,41,014 N-95 masks, 2,71,072, PPE kits, 42,70,969 surgical masks, 32,93,958 gloves, the state is well equipped to tackle the situation and is also distributing 16 crore masks; three masks for every individual in the state. This has become an income source to DWACRA women in the state with an income of Rs 500 per day.
While the livelihood of people has halted due to lockdown, the state government with Rs 1125 core expenditure has come to rescue by providing ration three times in a month free of cost ensuring the social distancing strictly.
Moreover, financial assistance of Rs 1,000 is also being provided for every poor family and that amounts up to Rs 1470 crore burden on the state government. The government is also providing ration and Rs 1,000 to the people in need irrespective of having the ration card. Financial assistance of Rs 5,000 is given for those who are dependent on the temples, masjid, and churches.
Though the government is incurring a daily loss of Rs 150 crore, the government has cleared fee reimbursement dues of Rs 1880 crore and getting ready to clear the dues up to March 31 of the current academic year. From the next academic year the fee reimbursement amount will be credited in installments in mothers’ accounts for every three month.
Dry ration and dal are being supplied to parents as the mid-day meals program has been stopped. The state has included COVID-19 under Aarogyasri and also cleared the Aarogyasri medical bill dues that were unpaid by the previous TDP government.
While intensifying the COVID-19 preventive measures, the state is ensuring the welfare of the public in other sectors. The state is gearing up to pay Rs 7,500 to the farmers in May under Rythu Bharosa and the scheme is being implemented transparently irrespective of region, religion, and party.
The state is spending Rs 500 for bed and food every day, Rs 100 for other expenses and Rs 600 to and fro charges for those who are in quarantine centers besides providing Rs 2,000 to poor while leaving the quarantine centres.
To harvest the crop, the Government has rented 2985 harvesters with a price of Rs 1800- Rs 2200 per hour. Government has started Paddy and Maize marketing centres. 11 lakh metric tons of Pesticides have been collected and stored for the next Kharif season which includes 3.5 tons of Urea. The government also prepared 7.7 lakh tons of Paddy and Groundnut seeds for next season.
Government has announced prices for Aqua products and also opened processing units and resumed the export of Aqua products. Govt also ensured to sell aqua products in local markets.
The government permitted the operation of 24 types of industries in Green Clusters. Industries include oil mills, Dal mills, flour mills, dairy products, water bottling units, food processing units (Includes sugar factories), Bulk Drugs manufacturing units, oxygen manufacturing units, Medical equipment, products, soaps, detergents, masks, bodysuits, sanitary napkins, cold storage, godowns, logistics and agriculture allied industries like manufacturing units of turmeric, salt, Mirchi Powder and Ayurvedic Drugs, Pollution Treatment Plants and Seed Processing Units, and essential products from e-commerce companies like Walmart, Amazon, etc.
ICMR approves Korean rapid testing kits
Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) has proved rapid testing kits arrived from South Korea and the COVID-19 tests will be continued as per protocol.
This was revealed at a review meeting, chaired by Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy here on Thursday.
The officials informed the Chief Minister that so far 48,034 tests have been conducted of which 6,520 were held on Wednesday. Andhra Pradesh tops in the country with 961 COVID-19 tests per million population. Chief Minister appreciated the officials for the effective measures and instructed them to scale up the number of tests gradually.
Of the 14,423 tests conducted using the rapid testing kits,11,543 were done in red zones and 30 positive cases identified. The samples with are sent to PCR tests for confirmation, said officials.
Instructing the officials on tackling the situation, the Chief Minister asked the officials to prioritize Thallasemia, cancer, and dialysis patients. The 104 services should be alert and pregnancy cases should be attended to without delay. . With concern to the agriculture sector, he instructed the officials to ensure that 1902 toll-free services are fully functional. Details on crop prices and other crop-related issues should be collected from agriculture assistant in villages where farmers can report their issues. He ordered the officials to supply varieties of fruits for Rs 100 and make it a continuous process. Apart from these, Chief Minister ordered the officials to identify land for the construction of proposed new medical colleges in the state
With concern to the fake news being published in newspapers, the officials told Chief Minister that musk melon crop left in the field in Guntur district and bananas from Kadapa being damaged after reaching Vijayawada Rythu Bazaars, both the issues were falsely reported in the newspapers.
The farmers revealed the fact that the two earlier crops in the musk melon farm have received Minimum Support Price and the third crop was crumbled and left in the field as it could not have made to transportation charges.
The bananas from Kadapa are being sent to local Rythu Bazaars from Vijayawada Rythu Bazaar. Another alarming news being falsely reported in newspapers without any information from the concerned officials is hiding the COVID-19 positive cases, a release from CMO said
