KARACHI: Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah on Sunday directed the health department to start a mobile facility in katchi abadis of the city to check the spread of the coronavirus.

“I am ready to provide extra kits to different labs,” he said, adding that if tested positive the confirmed patients would be shifted to isolation centres.

He said that a large number of positive cases were surfacing in the city’s slums. “In katchiabadis people have no space in their houses to stay in home isolation, therefore they would be shifted to isolation centres,” he said.

Mr Shah said that 11 hospitals/labs — Aga Khan University Hospital, Indus hospital, Civil Hospital, Dow’s Ojha hospital, Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre, Sindh Institute of Urology and Transplantation, Ziauddin Hospital, Chughtai Hospital and Gambat hospital — had the capacity of conducting 3,520 tests per day.

He was told that at present a stock of 16,920 swabs, 15,920 Viral Transport Media, 27,000 extraction and 23,700 amplification tests was available with the provincial authorities.

Says 93 more test positive for Covid-19 in the province

The CM said that an order for purchase of 190,000 testing kits had already been placed.

Rations distribution work reviewed

Chairing another meeting, the chief minister reviewed the process of distributing ration bags among the deserving people.

The meeting was attended by Labour Minister Saeed Ghani, Energy Minister Imtiaz Shaikh, Information Minister Nasir Shah, Law Adviser Murtaza Wahab and others. The CM was told that around 200,000 ration bags had been provided to the deserving people at their doorsteps.

It was informed the distribution of ration was being done early in the morning.

The CM was told that the deputy commissioners and their teams were doing the job and time to time a provincial minister inspected the distribution work.

The chief minister once again emphasized the need of keeping ration distribution work confidential. “It must be between the distributor and recipient,” he said, adding: “We have to keep in mind the respect and the dignity of the people.”

68.3pc males among infected

The CM said during the last 24 hours 93 new cases of coronavirus were detected while two more patients died. He said that during the last 24 hours 569 tests were conducted, of them 93 were diagnosed as positive. “The number of tests conducted so far comes to 13,309 while tally of the positive cases has risen to 1,411,” he said.

He said that two more patients died taking the death tally to 30, or 2.1 per cent of the total patients.

He said that the number of patients recovered during the last 24 hours was 18 and added that so far 389 patients had recovered and returned to their respective home.

The chief minister said that the percentage of cured patients in terms of the total positive cases was 28pc.

Giving details of the patients, Mr Shah said that at present 645 were in home isolation, 60 at Isolation Centers and 992 under treatment at different hospitals of the province.

Talking about frequency of the age of the patients, Mr Shah said that 71 patients were between one and 10 years, 118 between 11 and 20, 311 between 21 and 30, 260 between 31 and 40, 196 between 41 and 50, 226 between 51 and 60, 152 between 61 and 70, 47 between 71 and 80 and five patients were between 81 and 90 years of age.

“This shows that the people of every age are prone to the virus, therefore we all have to be careful in our movement and must maintain social distancing even at home,” he said.

He also disclosed new data under which he said 68.3pc male and 31.7pc female had been affected.

“The ratio shows that the males have been affected more than the females because they frequently go out of their homes and do not care of social distancing as has been advised by experts,” he said, adding that then the male members become carriers of the virus and bring it back to their homes.

The chief minister once again urged the people to maintain social distancing and properly observe the ongoing lockdown. “Otherwise we will not be able to contain the virus,” he added.

Published in Dawn, April 13th, 2020