Bhubaneswar: Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik today sanctioned Rs 20.64 crore to run the new dedicated COVID hospitals and COVID Care Centres for the next three months in Khurda and Cuttack districts. The amount has been sanctioned from the Chief Minister’s Relief Fund.
The Odisha CM said, “More than one lakh people have returned back from outside the State in the two districts of Khurda and Cuttack. In spite of the large influx of migrants, the situation is under control with recovery rate of 70% in Khurda and 71% in Cuttack, which is much above the National average of 63%.”
Naveen appreciated the teams in both these districts for achieving higher recovery rates.
In Khurda district, two COVID hospitals will be coming up soon. The first being, 150-bed (including 30 bed ICU) dedicated COVID Hospital by Aditya Ashwini Hospital. While another COVID Hospital at Nilanchal Hospital with 126 beds and 15 ICU beds will be operational this week, the Chief Minister’s Office informed.
“With active partnership of MLAs, community, religious organisations, resident welfare associations, NGOs and Corporates, I am happy to know that 1,385 beds in Covid Care Homes will be established soon. I hope this will inspire more such organisations to come forward to join the fight against Covid,” the Chief Minister said.
Special focus will be laid on the slum areas to contain the spread of the virus. The Slum committees have been working well. Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC) will appreciate and incentivise the good work done by the slum committees, the CMO informed.
Similarly, in Cuttack district, 925 additional beds in COVID hospitals and Covid Care Centres are being established. The health infrastructure in the district is being expanded to take care of the increasing number of cases.
A press note by the CMO stated, “Training and information centre for COVID-19 at SCB Medical College will be operational soon. The Molecular Genome Lab in SCB MCH for viral and human host genome sequencing to predict the prognosis of Covid-19 patients will be upgraded.”
Rs 15 crore has been sanctioned to Cuttack district from Chief Minister Relief Fund. Special focus will be laid on the congested areas in Cuttack city through active involvement of ‘Puja’ committees and ‘Sahi’ Committees, it added.
