Karnataka Imposes Restrictions, Issues New Covid Testing Guidelines For Arrivals From Foreign Countries

Karnataka Fresh COVID Guidelines: As per the new guidelines, the Karnataka government said the testing through RT-PCR should be done for the symptomatic persons at the airport testing laboratory and for those found positive, the samples shall be sent for genome sequencing.

Karnataka Lockdown News Today: Amid rising cases of coronavirus, the Karnataka government on Saturday imposed fresh restrictions and issued new COVID testing guidelines for international arrivals from countries such as Japan and Thailand. The state government also instructed officials to initiate surveillance measures for those arriving from these countries, including RT-PCR tests for symptomatic cases at the airport testing laboratory.

Earlier, Karnataka Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai had indicated that precautionary and surveillance measures may be reintroduced at airports and border districts of the state, depending on the Centre’s advisory. He had said this amid apprehensions of a possible fourth wave of the pandemic. 

What are the new COVID guidelines?

• The state government said instructions have been given to conduct screening, surveillance and tele-monitoring for certain international arrivals as per the recommendations of the State COVID-19 Technical Advisory Committee (TAC).
• The state government also added that at Bengaluru International Airport and Mangaluru International Airport, the arrivals from those countries should undergo thermal screening.
• As per the guidelines, the testing through RT-PCR should be done for the symptomatic persons at the airport testing laboratory and for those found positive, the samples shall be sent for genome sequencing.
• The treatment and management of COVID patients will be followed as per the state government protocol.
• At the district and Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) level, tele-monitoring of the international passengers (from Japan and Thailand) should be done at their respective districts for 14 days through call centre.
• The state government said if anybody develops symptoms during the follow-up period, testing, treatment and management of the case should be taken up as per the protocol by the district teams.
• However, Principal Secretary to Health and Family Welfare T K Anil Kumar said the COVID situation in Karnataka is well under control, with a daily average of 110 cases and test positivity rate ranging between 0.9 and 1.1 per cent, and currently 2 per cent of international arrivals from designated countries are screened randomly at airports.

Corona cases in Karnataka:

The development comes as Karnataka on Saturday reported 126 fresh COVID cases, 76 recoveries, and 2 deaths in the last 24 hours. With the new cases, the active cases in the state stand at 1,785 and the positivity rate has gone up to 1.26%.