Dharamshala: The central taskforce committee on Thursday invited volunteer doctors and healthcare workers who are willing to provide their services at the local healthcare facility in the settlements.
Joint Secretary of Health Department, Tenzin Kunsang informed in her briefing that 22 volunteer health care workers so far have been assigned in 16 settlements for Covid-19 purposes only following the committee meeting held last Monday.
The committee headed by its President Palden Dhondup, Secretary of Health Department held a meeting to review the Covid status in the Tibetan community as well as to chalk out the future course of actions in this regard.
The committee also met with the heads and physicians of Delek hospital to discuss the administration of vaccination for children under 15 that is likely to begin in March as announced by the central government of India.
According to the latest committee report, the complete vaccinated Tibetans in India stand at 49,816 while 478 are partially vaccinated. In Nepal, 6990 Tibetans are fully vaccinated. Likewise, fully vaccinated children under 18 in India stand at 389 while 896 only received the first jab. In Nepal, 91 children aged 15-18 are fully vaccinated while 9 are partially vaccinated.
As India began administration of precautionary doses for health and frontline workers, and people aged 60 and above with comorbidities in January, a total of 3167 Tibetans so far in India and Nepal have been covered under this initiative.
The mass testing drive this week covered 511 Tibetans in India and Nepal. Out of the tested individuals, 233 were tested positive. Two Tibetans died this week due to Covid complications. This brings the total cases reported in the community to 8987, 8599 have recovered, 166 reported fatalities, and 299 active cases.
As overall Covid-19 situation is gradually improving, people are advised to strictly adhere to the safety protocols as constantly directed by the Health Department.
“India records a positivity rate of 4.44% a sharp decline in the rate compared to the 17-20% positivity rate recorded in January. This is a hopeful indication of possibly preventing the third wave,” stated Dr Tsundue at the weekly briefing.
“Covid situation worldwide except for a few countries have improved to a great extent which has allowed governments to impose certain relaxations of containment measures. India for example commences quarantine free entry for foreign travellers from countries listed in the mutual agreement of vaccination certificates, ” he informed. However, the requirement of mandatory negative RT-PCR of 72 hours upon entrance is still in exercise.
According to the latest guideline issued by the government of India, a reduction in the vaccination gap from 84 days to 28 days has been allowed to accelerate India’s vaccination progress.