Telangana condemns PIB release on COVID-19

In a statement on Tuesday night, Director of Public Health Dr. G. Srinivasa Rao strongly condemned and expressed utmost displeasure at the PIB's press release. He alleged that the PIB resorted to blame game.

PIB, a nodal agency of the central government, targeted Telangana in its daily bulletin on COVID for not doing mass testing.

According to PIB release, the Telangana High Court tore into the state government for not doing mass testing for COVID-19 and summoned public health director Dr G. Srinivas Rao to appear before it to explain. "While Telangana, after much delay, has started rapid antigen testing, it is not following the ICMR protocol strictly. Though the ICMR has suggested that those who test negative in an antigen test, need to undergo a RT-PCR test, the government has decided to ask symptomatic people to go into isolation, instead of testing them again," it said.

The state government, however, took exception to the tone and tenor of the PIB's release. Srinivas Rao accused it of making false allegations. Stating that the release is absolutely baseless, he said it tried to tarnish the efforts of the state in the control and management of COVID-19.

"In fact, The Honourable high court took stock of the situation and appreciated the efforts taken by the state in terms of testing, hospital preparedness and case management. Telangana state has maintained and strictly followed all the protocols and SOPs of ICMR as well as Government of India," he said.

Claiming that Telangana is taking all required measures in securing its citizens from COVID-19, the director urged the citizens of Telangana to beware of such news.

Meanwhile, Telangana on Tuesday conducted 13,175 tests, the highest in a day. The director said 1,524 samples tested positive. With this the number of positive cases rose to 37,745.

The state also saw 10 fatalities during the day, pushing the death toll to 375. As many as 1,161 people recovered from COVID-19, taking the total number of recoveries to 24,840.

The number of active cases stands at 12,531. Out of 1,524 new cases reported on Tuesday, Greater Hyderabad accounted for 815 cases. Neighbouring Rangareddy saw a big spike with 240 new cases. Medchal and Sangareddy, also bordering the state capital, reported 97 and 61 cases.