Govt response sought on accuracy of COVID data

A division bench comprising Justice MM Sundresh and Justice R Hemalatha issued notice seeking the government to explain even while government pleader R Jayarprakash Narayanan claimed that every detail regarding coronavirus was available in public domain, adding that the plea from the opposition MLA was politically motivated.

Palanivel Thiagarajan, also the IT wing secretary of DMK, cited the various discrepancies in the data provided by the government regarding the number of tests, recovery rate and death rate, and submitted that such discrepancies would affect the outcome of research on how to handle the pandemic.

He further noted that death toll played a major role in understanding the virulence of the virus, but the State government had fudged the numbers and failed to abide by the guidelines issued by WHO and Indian Council of Medical Research.

In the absence of a vaccine, the intensity of the spread could be gauged only by the data provided by the government and that alone can pave way for people becoming aware of the ground reality and follow the prescribed norms, the MLA said.

Thiagarajan sought a direction to all the District Collectors to provide comprehensive district wise data on a daily basis about the affected, the number of victims, recovery details and the number of beds available in private and government hospitals.