Corpn’s door-to-door survey shoddy, allege residents

However, several residents complain that the workers employed in the drive failed to collect the full details of the residents.

“The Chennai Corporation has instructed every worker to visit the allotted household every day for 90 days and follow up the health condition of the residents. But, they visit only once in two days,” M Vishnupriya, a resident of Teynampet said.

She added that they collected the names of family members and phone numbers, but did not ask when the residents had any suspected symptoms. “The persons who visited on Monday looked like college students, and they struggled to ask questions clearly.” Residents from several parts of the city also raised similar complaints. Balamurugan, a resident of Kolathur tweeted that workers who visited his house had revealed that the civic body had asked them to collect family details and did not give any instructions about other questions.

Another resident of the same locality argued with the Corporation worker asking him to visit all the houses in his apartment complex when he found out that the worker had called the residents to gather outside to provide details. “The next day, he shouted from the street asking the residents to come out. When I confronted him, he did not even have the details of two pregnant women in the apartment and diabetic patients,” the resident said.

The civic body claimed that it had covered 18,63,055 households of total 20,20,871 households in the city as on Sunday. A total of 3,036 persons have been identified with symptoms and 775 persons are under continuous follow-up. Around 11,000 workers have been deployed, each of them tasked to cover 90 to 100 houses repeatedly.

It is also learnt from a Chennai Corporation source that Chennai Corporation Commissioner G Prakash is unhappy with the work of Health department while maintaining records and pulled them up on Sunday.

With Royapuram zone recording the highest number of COVID-19 positive cases, the Greater Chennai Corporation has sealed 18 localities and started collecting samples from neighbours of the affected persons.

Ruling out the possibility of sealing the entire zone, a Corporation official explained that the cases have

been reported in particular spots. There was no prevalence across the zone, he said. “Positive cases have been reported from 18 localities, and we have sealed all of them. Of them, a large number of cases reported from 8 locations,” the official said. He added 18 cases have been reported in Pudupet area, while 11 were from Mint Street. There are three cases from Ellis Road. As on Sunday, 63 COVID-19 positive cases are reported from Royapuram zone.

Following the increasing number of cases, the health officials in the zone are taking samples from the neighbours of the affected persons.

“We took samples from the family members first. After that, we collected samples from the residents of the buildings. Majority of the positive cases are from single source and the immediate contacts,” he added.