ITANAGAR, Jun 1: The state government has initiated a long-term policy for developing a robust health infrastructure in the state to fight the Covid-19 pandemic, Chief Minister Pema Khandu said on Monday.
The government has decided to utilize funds under the North East Special Infrastructure Development (NESID) and the North Eastern Council for upgrading the state’s health sector, he said.
“A long-term policy for robust infrastructure and facilities for all 25 district hospitals in the state has been rolled out with proposed allocation of Rs 350 crore,” Khandu told reporters in his office here.
“The government in order to tackle the pandemic has provided funds to all 26 deputy commissioners by providing an amount of Rs 12 lakhs each from the state disaster response fund to deal with the situation. A separate fund of Rs 1.3 crore has been released from the chief minister’s relief fund (CMRF) to all the superintendents of police,” he said.
Khandu said the government has also released Rs 15 crore under the Mukhya Mantri Rogi Kalyan Kosh to the districts, besides reducing the salaries of all lawmakers by 30 percent from April this year to March 2021.
“The fund will go to the state exchequer and will be used in the fight against Covid-19,” he said.
“As of date a total of 3,496 persons are in quarantine facilities while 7,968 are in home quarantine,” Khandu said, adding that the government has decided to outsource sample testing by private parties to ease out the huge backlog.
The chief minister said the state has made institutional quarantine mandatory for the returnees, and that after testing negative, they will have to go undergo compulsory home quarantine.
“Our efforts are to detect positive cases in quarantine facilities so that the spread of the virus could be checked,” the chief minister said.
He said the government has released Rs 5.20 crore from the CMRF for the people of the state who are stranded in other states because of the nationwide lockdown.
“The amount was released to assist 14,859 stranded people, which was credited directly to their bank accounts through direct bank transfer,” Khandu said.
“The government has also proposed recruiting for 60 vacant posts of general duty medical officers through the Arunachal Pradesh Public Service Commission to strengthen the health sector,” he said.
He added that the government would soon equip all the check gates in the state with TrueNat machines. (PTI)
