Delhi Health Minister Satyendar Jain on Saturday said whether further Covid-related restrictions need to be imposed in the national capital will be reviewed as hospital admissions are less, despite a rapid rise in coronavirus cases.
He also said that in view of the current situation, more than 3,000 beds have been prepared for children.
In a massive surge, Delhi on Saturday recorded 2,716 fresh Covid cases, the highest single-day rise since May 21, and one death while the positivity rate mounted to 3.64 per cent, according to data shared by the health department.
"Prevention is better than cure and people need to keep themselves safe at all times. It should be our responsibility to wear masks at all times whenever we are heading outside our homes, this will help us to stop the further spread of coronavirus," Mr Jain told reporters.
He asserted that the national capital is fully prepared to inoculate children in the 15-18 age group against the coronavirus. Vaccination for this category starts on January 3.
"Delhi has appropriate and enough infrastructure and vaccination centres to vaccinate three lakh people a day. The Delhi government is fully prepared to vaccinate children between 15-18 years of age. We have a full stock of booster (precaution) doses available for the vaccination of the people of Delhi," Mr Jain said.
The vaccine option for those in the 15-18 age group would only be Covaxin, according to the "Guidelines for Covid-19 vaccination of children between 15-18 years and precaution dose to HCWs, FLWs and 60+ population with comorbidities" issued by the Union health ministry.
Vaccination with the precaution dose of health care workers (HCWs), frontline workers (FLWs) and people over 60 years with comorbidities starts from January 10.
The Delhi minister said keeping in view the ongoing situation, more than 3,000 beds have already been prepared for children.
"All healthcare workers are being trained and instructed properly for the treatment of coronavirus patients. There is no separate treatment for different variants of the virus," Mr Jain said.
The Delhi Disaster Management Authority (DDMA) had on Wednesday decided that Covid-related restrictions imposed in Delhi under the ''yellow alert'' would continue for the time being and authorities would monitor the situation for a while before deciding on fresh curbs.
"We have put the restrictions in place. In other states, only night curfew has been imposed. But in Delhi, we have shut down schools, multiplexes, etc. In April and May when the second (Covid) wave had hit Delhi, a large chunk of people were getting admitted. But currently the hospitalisations are less. Further restrictions will be reviewed," Mr Jain said.
On Tuesday, the DDMA had declared the "yellow alert'' under the Graded Response Action Plan (GRAP) in the city amid a spike in cases following the emergence of the Omicron variant.
The alert entails restrictions like night curfew, closure of schools and colleges, opening of shops selling non-essential items on an odd-even basis and halved seating capacity in Metro trains and buses, among other things.
The GRAP is based on positivity rate (on two consecutive days), cumulative number of new cases (over a week) and average oxygenated-bed occupancy (for a week) for designated four levels of alerts.
After the "yellow alert'', further restrictions are imposed at advanced stages of "amber'', "orange'' and "red'' with a higher number of new cases and hospitalisations.
Mr Jain said that "people are demanding Omicron test these days".
"This is to inform them that the information on Omicron is necessary only for the government and policy makers so that it can ensure the system works accordingly. Patients will not get to know anything new about the variant because the treatment process for other coronavirus variants is exactly the same as the Omicron variant," he said.
"The Omicron variant is a variant of the coronavirus itself and the protocol for its treatment and prevention is also the same as before," Mr Jain said.
He stressed that Omicron patients have not required oxygen till now.
