Pune: The epicentre of novel coronavirus, Pune on Tuesday received praise, as the Health Ministry on Tuesday mentioned that the ‘Pune Model’, has successfully tackled the second wave of the infection. The Ministry also said that Pune Model has also helped to drop the COVID-19 positivity rate.
In a media statement, the Union Health Ministry stated that the decentralised approach of the Mumbai (BMC) in handling the case spike needed to be implemented at the national level. The Ministry also quoted Pune as a ‘fine example’ of putting containment measures in place that worked. A press statement issued by the Press Information Bureau read, “The way in which Pune contained the upsurge of Covid-19 cases drew praise from the ministry, as a fine example that shows how containment measures can help restrict the spread of the disease.”
It stated that when Pune had seen a sharp rise of 69.7 per cent case positivity rate in the first week of March (2021), it had initiated restrictive measures such as night curfew, imposed from 11 pm to 6 am. This resulted in reduction in growth trajectory of cases and drop in the positivity rate, which came down to 41.8 per cent and further to 23.4 per cent.
Joint Secretary Lav Agarwal in a statement said, “We observed that strict measures like restrictions on mass gatherings and intermingling of people, along with closing of non-essential activities for a period of 15 days, reduced the rate of growth in cases, and the cases started plateauing.”
Meanwhile, in a continuous drop in new infections, Pune district on Tuesday witnessed 7,714 new cases taking the progressive tally to 9,33,516. Talking about the fatalities, 142 patients lost their lives taking the death total to 14,642 in the district. On the positive front, 8775 patients were recovered in 24-hours taking the number of recoveries to 8,28,296 in Pune district.
FIRST OXYGEN EXPRESS FOR PUNE
The first Oxygen Express for Pune carrying over 50 MT (metric tonnes) of LMO (Liquid Medical Oxygen) from Angul in Odisha reached its destination on Tuesday night. A Green Corridor has also been channelled for a fast movement of the Oxygen Express trains, the railways stated. The trains are being run from steel plants that yield oxygen to different parts of the country.
Pune, one of the worst hit-city also faced with the issue of erratic oxygen supply in past few weeks, while many hospitals in Pune were unable to meet the increasing demand of medical oxygen for treating COVID-19 patients. Some private hospitals in PMC (Pune Municipal Corporation) limits had even halted admitting patients for treatment while some smaller facilities were moving their patients to big hospitals The PMC has also tried to get aid for the medical oxygen from other states to meet the increasing demand. The city will also witness oxygen generation plants at Naidu Hospital, Dalvi Hospital and Baner hospitals in the coming days.
With the oxygen express arriving in Pune, it’s a great help for the district during the unprecedented times. Amid shortage of oxygen to treat coronavirus patient, the railways has chalked out plans to transport medical oxygen from various parts of the country.
Minister of Railways, Piyush Goyal also shared a video of the train reaching Pune and captioned: “First #OxygenExpress for Pune with life-saving medical oxygen has reached from Angul for COVID-19 patients in Maharashtra.”
The Minister of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, Prakash Javadekar also shared a video on his official Twitter handle about the Oxygen Express arriving in Pune.
According to the Railway Ministry, more than 5735 MT of oxygen delivered by the special trains to the states/UT. According to an official statement, till Tuesday afternoon, 293 tonnes of LMO was offloaded in Maharashtra, nearly 1,630 tonnes in UP, 340 tonnes in Madhya Pradesh, 812 tonnes in Haryana followed by 123 tonnes in Telangana, 40 tonnes in Rajasthan, 120 tonnes in Karnataka while 2,383 tonnes in Delhi.
The first Oxygen Express train was run on April 19, when empty tankers started their journey from Mumbai to be loaded with LMO from Visakhapatnam in Andhra Pradesh.
