Staff Reporter
GUWAHATI: Who are the target people the entire force of the State Health Department wants to isolate for their and others’ safety in the State? To be specific, this target group comprises anyone who has come to the State from a foreign country, the people who have mingled with them knowingly or unknowingly, anyone to have come to the State from other States of the country.
This has been revealed in a conversation on coronavirus which this reporter had with Joint Director of Health, Kamrup (M) district, Ganesh Saikia.
When asked by this reporter on preventive and awareness measures taken by the State Health department for the slum dwellers in Kamrup (M) district, Saikia said, “We’ve no specific measures for slum dwellers or any other groups. Who we want to isolate through isolation are the foreigners from COVID-19 affected countries, the people of the State who might have mingled with those foreigners by staying with them in the same place or travelling in the same ship, people of the State who have returned to their homes from abroad or other States of the country or anyone coming to the State from another State. This is for all, irrespective of general people or slum dwellers. If anyone from the slums of Guwahati comes from another State or a country, he/she will also be kept in isolation.”
The Kamrup(M) district has over 200 slum areas who have been staying mostly in unhygienic condition.
In a similar conversation, Kamrup (M) Deputy Commissioner Biswajit Pegu told this reporter that there has been a standing order for supplying ration for a week for slum dwellers so that they don’t have to come out violating the lockdown rules.
The DC said that people violate lockdown rules for collecting food materials. “If ration for a week is given to people in slum areas, the possibility of violating the lockdown rules by them is minimized,” he said.