Bhubaneswar: With no let up in surge of Coronavirus cases in Odisha, the State government on Tuesday announced to initiate plasma therapy in some hospitals from July 15 (tomorrow).
Convalescent plasma therapy is a method involving use of blood plasma from people who have recovered from COVID-19 and infusing it into patients who currently have the disease.
The decision to begin the treatment was taken during a review meeting chaired by CM Naveen Patnaik. As per sources, the treatment will be rolled out in Bhubaneswar SUM Hospital & KIMS along with Cuttack Ashwini Hospital. Cuttack SCB Hospital has been designated as the nodal centre of plasma therapy.
Chief Minister Patnaik during the meeting stressed on various measures to curb the rise in SARS-nCoV infections which has so far killed 74 persons in the State. While around 7000 RT-PCR tests are presently being conducted on a daily basis, the State government has set a target to increase the testing capacity to 9000 a day within a week.
The government has informed that guidelines will be issued so that people can avail testing facilities in private hospitals.
The officials have been asked to give focus on containing the outbreak of Covid situation in Ganjam, Cuttack, Jajpur, Sundergarh and Khurda on a priority basis.
It is reminded here that the Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC) is undertaking sero surveillance in the city to monitor the trend of COVID-19 infection and immunological status of the community and high-risk groups. The exercise is being carried out by BMC with technical support of RMRC.
As far as coronavirus cases are concerned, Odisha registered 14,280 cases of infections so far of which 4929 are active now. As many as 9255 patients have recovered from the disease while 74 fatalities have been reported in the State as of now.
Earlier in the day, the State witnessed 543 new cases of infections and four deaths.
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