Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray on Thursday participated in a virtual meeting where Prime Minister Narendra Modi interacted with collectors of 17 districts from Maharashtra to share the best practices to check Covid-19 cases.
Dr Rajendra Bhosale, the Ahmednagar District Collector, spoke in the meeting about how the Hiware Bazar village was made corona-free and the pattern is being implemented in 1,316 other villages.
Bhosale, while explaining the initiatives taken at Hiware Bazar village, said that four teams of health staff and volunteers were set up to survey each house in the village. “The team took the responsibility of the family of each patient with Covid symptoms. It encouraged the patients to get admitted to isolation wards as they did not have to worry about their family, farm and dairy work. Those who were initially opposed to treatment in isolation agreed to it due to responsibility taken by the teams. The village soon became the Covid-free,” said Bhosale in the meeting, adding that the Hiware Bazar pattern is being implemented in 1316 villages in the districts.
Bhosale also said that separate nodal officers were appointed for Covid testing, vaccination, fees charged by private hospital for treatment, oxygen availability and transportation. “The village level system was involved in it through a direct dialogue with the sarpanch, gram sevak, talathi and others and presented the concept of my village, my responsibility. Also, for the second wave, home isolation was completely stopped and patients were treated in Covid care centres, which helped reduce patients,” he said.
Officials from the Chief Minister’s Office said that only one person from each state was allowed to speak in the meeting and Bhosale was the only one to speak from Maharashtra. CM Thackeray, Health Minister Rajesh Tope, Chief Secretary Sitaram Kunte and other senior officials also attended the meeting.
As per the statement from the CMO, the Union health secretary in his presentation at the meeting appreciated the efforts taken on oxygen management and tackling Covid in Mumbai.
