Ma Su inspects testing of int'l passengers at Chennai airport

CHENNAI: Health Minister Ma Subramanian inspected the testing procedures of international passengers at the Chennai International Airport on Saturday.

As per the directions of the Union Government, the random testing of two percent of international passengers upon arrival began at the International airport in the State- Trichy, Coimbatore, Madurai and Chennai on Saturday.

"At least 37 international passengers coming from Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Dubai, Doha and Sri Lanka foreign countries have been tested so far at the International Chennai airport. None of them have any symptoms so far, " the minister said.

The Health Minister along with the health secretary and the Director of Public Health and Preventive Medicine also inspected the fever screening system at the airport that checks the temperature of all the passengers and if anyone is found to have symptoms of Covid-19, they will be treated as per the protocol.

"If there are any positive cases, they will be immediately sent for genomic sequencing at the State Public Health Laboratory to identify the type of variant, " he said.

The minister said that there are 1.15 lakh beds available for patients in the government hospitals in Tamil Nadu, of which 72,000 beds are ready for Covid-19 patients.

The drugs and medicines required for the treatment of Covid-19 is available in the warehouses in adequate amount as the stock is kept ready for next three months.

The oxygen concentrators, generators and oxygen cylinders are also available in all the government hospitals in adequate numbers, so there is no need to fear over management of cases of Covid -19. During a meeting with the Union Health Ministry on Friday, the availability of beds, oxygen and medicines and the status of the infection in the State has been communicated.

He added that there are about three lakhs of vaccines available in the State and the distribution from the Union Government has also stopped. The production has come to a halt after the numbers came down and people hesitated to get vaccinated with a precautionary booster dose. The intra-nasal vaccine Incovacc, that was recently approved is also available in private hospitals.

"We will request more number of vaccines so that those who are not vaccinated, can be given the vaccines. We will also request the nasal vaccine and if provided, we are ready to administer it to the ones eligible. The precautionary booster dose has been given to about 20 percent of the total eligible population, " he said.