Imphal : Chief minister N Biren Singh today attended a video conference of Union health Shri Harsh Vardhan with the CMs and health ministers of seven states to review the Covid-19 situation and informed Vardhan that 3,72,000 samples have so far been tested in Manipur.
He added that the testing rate has been improved for early detection of positive cases, said a statement issued by the CM’s secretariat .
The current testing rate per day per million population of Manipur is quite higher than the national average, he said.
Speaking at the video conference from his office secretariat in Imphal, the CM thanked the centre for extending all possible help to the state in combating the pandemic in the past 10 months.
With the assistance from the centre, the state has received 95 ventilators, 400 oxygen concentrated machines and 500 D-Type oxygen cylinders recently, Biren said.
Stating that the state government was earlier concerned about the rise in the mortality rate, the CM said it is slowly coming down now after a technical expert committee was formed to look into the matter, the statement added.
In the beginning, Manipur was doing extremely well in containing the virus. However, the state started witnessing sudden hike of positive cases after thousands of native Manipuris were brought in Shramik special trains, he informed.
In order to reduce the transmission rate, the state government is focusing on imparting awareness at the grassroots level, and for this, village level committees have been formed, and local clubs, organizations, NGOs, etc. have been roped in to get them involved in creating awareness to make people follow the SoPs strictly.
The main objective of the initiation is to gain momentum of the Jan Andolan campaign against COVID-19 and promote the COVID Appropriate Behavior (CAB), the statement said.
RIMS being a major and most important hospital of the state, Biren requested the Union minister to permit flexibility in the fund utilization so that the hospital may meet the urgent needs and cope up with the challenges that emerge from time to time in combating the virus.
Informing that manpower and equipment inadequacies of the central government-run hospital are even sometimes fulfilled with the funds from the state government considering its urgency, the CM said that he would list all the requirements of the hospital in detail in a letter to the Union health minister.
Biren also invited Vardhan in advance to the golden jubilee celebration of RIMS to be held next year, it said.
He also requested the Union minister to entrust the responsibility of the construction of the National Centre for Disease Control to the state government.
Vardhan assured Biren Singh to look into the matters raised during the video conference, the statement said.