the goan I network
PANAJI
Health Minister Vishwajit Rane on Wednesday sent a chill down Goa’s spine by revealing that till date, passengers from only the international flights were being scanned for the dreaded COVID-19 before they entered Goa through the Goa International Airport, Dabolim.
Addressing the media at his private office in Miramar, Rane stated, “Till date, only international flights were being scanned. Now, we are starting the scanning of domestic passengers, especially the foreigners who are coming through domestic flights. Give me about four to five days to see that precautions are put in place at all entry points to Goa.”
He disclosed that directions have been issued to the Airport Authority on Wednesday to scan all passengers regardless of the origin of their flight. Rane along with Health
Director Dr Jose D’Sa, Goa Medical College Dean Dr S M Bandekar and the Airport Director are expected to inspect the procedure of scanning of passengers who alight from flights at Goa airport.
“As far as domestic travellers are concerned, we see people coming in from Bombay, Pune as they have been asked to work from home till March 31. The problem is also that people employed aboard ships and cruise liners are coming back to Goa through Mumbai, Delhi and other airports. There is no way of tracking if they are travelling from a foreign country if they arrive aboard a domestic flight. We are trying to go more into the depths of the history of travel of these people entering Goa,’ Rane said.
The Health Minister has appealed to the people of Goa to report anyone who arrives from abroad or any COVID-19 affected areas is in their vicinity or housing society. He has requested people to self-quarantine themselves for 14 days if they have travelled to risky countries and foreigners, seafarers and Goans working abroad have been asked to inform the health services about their travel history upon their arrival.
“People should come forth and not hide their travel history. Even if someone writes wrong information in the self-declaration form at the airport, we will not know what is happening. We will now assign people only to go through these forms,” the Health Minister stated while asserting that people have to own up to their responsibilities without waiting for the government to do everything.
Meanwhile, in connection with contract tracing of the confirmed case of COVID-19 from Bengaluru, who travelled from Dubai to Bengaluru via Goa, Health Minister Vishwajit Rane informed that Health Secretary Nila Mohanan has identified names of 48 persons from their self-declaration forms.
“Of these, 35 have been located and contacted, five persons have been quarantined at government facilities as they were seated in the business class of the aircraft in close vicinity of the lady who has tested positive in Bengaluru. Eight have yet to be located,” Rane said.
The Health Department said that presently, it is relying solely on information based on the self declaration of the people who get down at Goa Airport. “After she tested positive, we had to go backwards and collect this information,” Rane said.
Regarding this issue, Rane made a staggering disclosure that a South Goa politician has also been identified in connection with this exercise. “But that fellow doesn’t want to be quarantined. They will lift him and put him in quarantine now,” Rane quipped.
It was later learnt that the politician in question is former minister Francisco ‘Mickky’ Pacheco, who reportedly addressed a public meeting in his constituency on Wednesday evening and steadfastly refused to be quarantined.
The Health Department has now roped in all private hospitals for expanding its quarantine capacity. The private hospitals will provide the support staff as well.
In addition to this, the Health Minister has further disclosed his plans to introduce the erasable ink stamps for people, as has been adopted in Mumbai.
