3 new clusters with 20 Covid-positives in North Bengaluru
BBMP has mapped colleges to nearest PHC
BENGALURU:
With colleges and student hostels across Karnataka set to reopen on Tuesday, BBMP has taken the initiative to streamline mandatory Covid-19 tests for students, teachers and non-teaching staff by mapping colleges to the nearest primary health centre (PHC) in Bengaluru city.
On Sunday, the state government had issued an SOP, in conformity with UGC guidelines, for all higher educational institutions. The government’s notification says students, teachers and non-teaching staff can attend college only if an RT-PCR test for Covid-19 comes negative. The test result is valid for 72 hours.
As per a press note issued by BBMP Commissioner N Manjunatha Prasad, there are around 432 colleges with more than 60,000 students, teachers and non-teaching staff spread across the city’s 198 wards.
According to their location, these educational institutions will be mapped to the nearest among the city’s 141 PHCs. Staff and students can get themselves tested at any nearby PHC between 9 am and 5 pm.
Mobile units too
In addition, around 450 mobile collection teams will be deployed near educational institutions/colleges. More teams will be stationed at places where there are several educational institutions/colleges.
According to the Commissioner, city colleges are expecting around 30% student attendance initially and BBMP swab collection units can cover this number in 1-2 days. As more students gradually start coming to colleges, more teams will deployed near colleges.
Results in 24 hours
Samples taken will be sent promptly to labs to get reports within 24 hours. BBMP medical officers will monitor the process to prevent delays and will also send sample collection data daily to cpmobbmp@gmail.com
The labs will test and upload results to the ICMR portal within 24 hours. All test reports can be accessed by students, teachers and non- teaching staff at https://www.covidwar.karnataka.gov.in/service1. The reports can also be downloaded in a PDF format.
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