PANAJI
The 14-member expert committee set up under the Covid third wave task force had its first meeting on Saturday to discuss the aspects involved in handling a possible third wave of Covid pandemic.
Among the primary recommendations compiled by this expert committee are the need to ramp up the existing infrastructure, focus on home monitoring of paediatric Covid patients, training of the paediatric medical staff and the urgent need to vaccinate all lactating mothers and women with children below the age of two years.
The task force and the expert committee have been constituted by the government to recommend a course of preparedness for facing a probable third wave of the Covid pandemic, which is predicted to surface in September this year.
The third wave is likely to affect children and adolescents below 18 years with children suffering from co-morbidities and who are on longer medications likely to be at a higher risk.
According to conservative estimates, around 3.5 to 4 lakh of Goa’s population is below 18 years of age while 2.5 to 3 lakh are estimated to be below the age of 12 years.
With this in mind, the committee took stock of the existing infrastructure in both private and government paediatric sectors and discussed how best it could be ramped up.
Three age groups including the newborn, general paediatric age group and the adolescent age group from 12 to 18 years of age were carefully considered with a particular focus on home monitoring.
Among the issues deliberated upon was the urgent need to vaccinate all lactating mothers and those with kids below two years of age because they will be in a position to pass on the antibodies to the babies and also be in a position to handle the babies during home monitoring.
Briefing media, members of the committee informed that it has recommended that this group must be prioritized during the vaccination campaign under the 18 to 44 years age category, especially those if such persons have co-morbidities so as to help in reducing the mortality rate.
Head of Paediatrics at Goa Medical College and Hospital Dr Mimi Silveira informed that most of the children who have tested positive for Covid so far have not had severe conditions requiring hospitalisation. Adding to this, Head of Preventive and Social Medicine at GMC Dr Jagdish Cacodkar disclosed that seven to eight per cent of those testing positive till last year were children below the age of 18 years. But over the last three months, this average has increased to 10 to 12 per cent of the total confirmed cases.
“Presently, Goa has around 101 neonatal ICU units. It has been decided that 10 more such units will be added at GMC and five more at the North Goa District Hospital with immediate effect.
This will be scaled up as and when the need arises. The State has 36 paediatric ICU beds and we have decided that if the need arises, 20 per cent of the adult ICU beds can be converted.
NGDH also has five Special Newborn Care Units (SNCU),” Dr Cacodkar stated.
He further said that the member doctors from Indian Academy of Pediatrics (IAP) have expressed their willingness to join Covid duty.
IAP has been asked to consider identification of at least one paediatric hospital each in North and South Goa, which can be later declared as paediatric Covid hospitals in case of requirement.
Meanwhile, the committee has accepted the Standard Treatment Protocol (STP) laid down earlier this month by the central government authorities to ensure uniformity in treatment and handling of mild, moderate and severe cases in children.
The State government will soon procure the medications used in treating paediatric Covid patients, which are radically different from the ones prescribed for adult patients.
Parallely, the training of doctors will be taken up over the coming days through webinars with the government aiming to ready its machinery over the next two months to handle the third wave of Covid.
The nominated experts on the committee include Health Director Dr Jose D’Sa, GMC Dean Dr S M Bandekar, State Epidemiologist Dr Utkarsh Betodkar, Head of Paediatrics at GMC Dr Mimi Silveira, senior paediatrician from Hospicio Dr Ira Almeida, senior paediatrician Dr Usgoankar and Dr Harshad Kamat , senior paediatrician and neonatologists Dr Virendra Goankar and Dr Shivanand Gauns, Dr Altekar from Asilo, Head of Preventive and Social Medicine at GMC Dr Jagdish Cacodkar, Dr Shekhar Salkar from Manipal Hospital, Dr Rajeshwar Naik and president of Indian Medical Association (Goa) Dr Vinayak Buwaji.
