Dr Zuben Kikon, Dy CMO and Dr Khesheli Awomi, Epidemiologist with the participants at the training on COVID-19 Containment and Management in peri-urban, rural and tribal areas held at Wokha on September 14.
Wokha, September 14 (MExN): Health workers in Wokha district received training on COVID-19 containment and management in peri-urban, rural and tribal areas at the CMO Conference hall Wokha on September 14, the Wokha CMO’s office informed on Tuesday.
In a press release, Wokha Chief Medical Officer Dr CW Tungoe said the training was held for senior medical officers, medical officers and community health officers to intensify COVID-19 testing and contact tracing at rural areas in the district. Taking note of the low COVID-19 testing rate in the district, the CMO urged the health units with low testing rates to ramp up the numbers.
During the training, Epidemiologist Dr Khesheli Awomi presented a brief report on the district’s COVID-19 profile from 2020 till date. She informed that during the first wave of the pandemic, the positive cases were confined to the armed forces and mostly asymptomatic in the district. However, in the second wave, young people between the age group of 15 to 29 years were mostly affected and positivity rate in the district was 2.2 percent in September, she added.
As per the release, Dr Awomi took session on COVID-19 containment plan which included topics on cluster containment strategy, role of district rapid response team, containment and buffer containment zones, containment plan for micro isolation, and breakthrough infection. She also reminded the health workers to report on active influenza-like illness (ILI) and severe acute respiratory infection (SARI) cases at their respective blocks to improve the surveillance activity.
A session on the roles and responsibilities of health workers to contain the disease was taken by Deputy CMO Dr Zuben Kikon, who highlighted that out of the 378 positive cases in the district, 273 were not vaccinated. The public should judge the efficacy of the COVID-19 vaccine through this data, he remarked. Also noting the active role of Block Rapid Response team in containing the disease, Dr Kikon requested the health workers to give proper reporting of contact tracing and random sample testing so as to improve the district COVID-19 status.
