The Karnataka government has issued fresh quarantine rules for interstate travelers. People reaching Karnataka from other States including Maharashtra will be placed in 14 day home quarantine. The earlier rule of seven-day institutional quarantine for those coming from Maharashtra has been scrapped. Testing will be mandatory for symptomatic persons reaching Karnataka from any other State. The people returning from Maharashtra account for the most number of COVID-19 cases in the state.

In an effort to encourage front line warriors, the Karnataka state Government is mulling over introducing an incentive of 5 marks to the medical students involved in COVID related work. The final year MBBS and nursing students are deployed at Covid Care Centers. About 2000 medical students appearing for PG exams will be utilized for Covid related work. It is also planned to introduce risk allowance for the front line health workers to boost their morale. The medical Education minister Dr. K Sudhakar informed yesterday that the government is also thinking of doubling the salaries of Group ‘D’ employees involved in Covid containment measures. He informed that a booth level task force committee will be set up in all the districts to provide focused attention to containment efforts in urban and rural areas.

In Karnataka, 1925 new Covid-19 positive cases were reported in the State, while 603 people were discharged from various hospitals and 37 people succumbed to the disease yesterday. The total number of affected people has gone up to 23,474 and the total number of recovered people has risen to 9847 in the State. 13,251 active cases are under treatment in various hospitals and so far more than seven lakh swab samples were tested in the State.

Keeping in mind the demand for beds,  Bangalore International Exhibition Centre ‘BIEC’ has been converted into India’s largest COVID Care Centre. With 10,100 beds, the sprawling centre is ready to keep asymptomatic and mildly asymptomatic patients including children.

The centre is well ventilated and has an adequate number of toilets, nursing stations, kitchens and other required facilities. Around 150 doctors will man the facility. A part of the centre has oxygenated beds to accommodate in-house emergencies.

The COVID Care Center was inspected by Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike Commissioner, A.H.Anil Kumar and MLA SR Vishwanath yesterday. The centre is well ventilated and has separate recreational facilities for both adults & children along with LED screens.

Meanwhile, India has achieved a remarkable feat by performing more than one crore COVID-19 test since the outbreak of the Corona pandemic in the country. Starting from less than 100 tests per day, a multiple-fold increase in a few months was made possible by dedicated teams of various stakeholders including research institutions, medical colleges, testing laboratories, Ministries, airlines and postal services. During the last 24 hours, more than 3,46000 COVID samples have been tested in the country.