Facing resistance from Delhi government, L-G withdraws 5-day institutional quarantine order

Facing resistance from ruling AAP government, Lt Governor of Delhi, Anil Baijal has withdrawn a controversial order issued by him which stated that anyone found positive with coronavirus in the national capital will have to undergo mandatory institutional quarantine for five days.

New Delhi:Delhi Lieutenant Governor Anil Baijal on Saturday rolled back the order on mandatory five-day institutional quarantine of Covid-19 patients in the national capital.

The Lieutenant Governor had on Friday ordered five-day mandatory institutional quarantine for every Covid-19 patient under home isolation.

The move was criticised as it was being opined that it would put further stress on the already stretched health infrastructure.

A day later, he withdrew the order and said, "Regarding institutional isolation, only those Covid positive cases which do not require hospitalisation on clinical assessment and do not have adequate facilities for home isolation would be required to undergo institutional isolation."

The development came after Delhi government opposed the order, asserting that institutional quarantine will make people evade testing which will further increase the spread of the infection.

The Delhi government also said the LG's decision on home quarantine is "arbitrary" and will "seriously harm" Delhi.

It further said there is already a severe shortage of doctors and nurses to treat serious patients and in such a scenario, from where would medical manpower come for taking care of these quarantine centres.

At the Delhi Disaster Management Authority meeting on Friday, the city government also raked up the issue of shortage of healthcare staff at the quarantine centres to oppose the L-G's order.

Delhi is among the states worst-affected by coronavirus. The rising number of cases have put severe stress on the health infrastructure here. Since last week, the Home Ministry has been steering the fight against coronavirus in the national capital.

According to the government, there are around 8,500 COVID-19 patients in home isolation in Delhi who are asymptomatic or have mild symptoms.

As per the directions given by the home minister, in a series of meetings chaired by him over last few days with regard to the COVID-19 situation in Delhi, house-to-house health survey in 242 containment zones of Delhi was completed on Thursday and a total of 2.3 lakh people were surveyed.

Shah had also directed for testing capacity to be increased, quick delivery of results in Delhi and testing through the rapid antigen testing method that was started on Thursday.

In a related development, Sisodia, who took over the charge of the Health Department in Satyendra Jain's absence, called an urgent meeting with the administrators and medical directors of top COVID dedicated hospitals.

Meanwhile, the national capital recorded a single-day spike of over 3,000 fresh coronavirus cases on Friday. Delhi has 53,116 total confirmed cases, out of which 2,035 have succumbed to the deadly disease.

With inputs from agencies