DPH issues revised guidelines for international arrivals from Dec 22

CHENNAI: As the Covid-19 cases witnessed a sudden surge in the number of cases in China and certain other countires recently, the Directorate of Public Health (DPH) and Preventive Medicine on Wednesday revised guidelines for international arrivals with effect from Thursday (December 22).

"Based on the Government of India Guidelines, the state government has also relaxed curbs for Covid-19 and withdrawn the random sampling of 2 percent of air passengers. In the past one week China has reported 1,48,697 cases, and 430 deaths, "stated Dr TS Selvavinayagam, Director of DPH.

Owing to the sudden rise of cases, some restrictions have also been reimposed in several districts of China and the reason for the surge has been found to be the Omicron variant BF.7 which is more infectious than the previous sub-variants.

Tamil Nadu has reported 49 cases and zero Covid-19 deaths in the last one week.

The state government has administered 12.74 crore vaccinations against COVID with 97 percent coverage of the first dose and 92 percent coverage of the second dose.

"Though the number of COVID cases in Tamil Nadu is continuously low, in view of the possible threat of Covid-19 outbreak due to the epidemic in China and Hong Kong, the director general of health services, MoHFW, GCI should issue necessary guidelines for mandatory testing of international passengers (as done in previous times) especially thos who travel from these two countries, " noted Selvavinayagam.

In addition to the continued focus on fivefold strategy i.e. Trace, Test, Treat, Vaccinations and Adherence to Covid-19 appropriate behavior as a precautionary measure to avoid another COVID surge in India.