Bhubaneswar: Drawing lessons from current spike in COVID-19 cases majorly detected in two clusters - a hospital and an industrial unit, Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC) on Friday imposed restrictions on engagement of workers from outside the State till July 31.
While addressing a presser, BMC Commissioner, Prem Chandra Chaudhary informed that recently an industrial organisation had sourced workers from outside Odisha and all of them were put under quarantine. During testing, 34 of them had tested positive for COVID-19.
“In view of public safety and to contain the spread of COVID-19 virus, it is ordered that any business organisation like industrial, construction, hotels/hospitality, contractors (both government and private) shall not bring any workers/ labourers from outside the State to BMC jurisdiction till July 3, 2020,” said a BMC notification.
BMC Commissioner informed that all the industrial establishments and others have been asked to engage locally available workers/labourers. If any organisation has already brought workers from outside the state, they needs to put their workers under 14-day quarantine, he added.
“The business owners will have to conduct COVID-19 test of the workers at their own cost if anyone of them develops symptoms and inform the test result to BMC,” Chaudhary said.
BMC officials further advised industrial units to not bring workers from COVID-19 hotspot districts within Odisha like Ganjam, Gajapati, Balasore, Cuttack and Jajpur districts. The establishments should rather opt for workforce from non-hotspot districts till further orders, BMC officials said in a statement.
BMC also issued fresh advisory for hospitals in Bhubaneswar today for isolating patients coming to OPD from various hotspot districts.
“The hospitals should segregate patients coming from hotspot districts and keep all their details. If any persons have symptoms, they will be tested and if they have accommodation facility in Bhubaneswar where they can stay in isolation till declaration of COVID-19 test results. It will be the concerned hospital’s responsibility to contact the nodal officer of BMC and take them to institutional quarantine facility,” Chaudhary added.
It is pertinent to mention here that there has been a spurt in COVID-19 cases reported from Bhubaneswar in the past few days. Of the 26 new COVID-19 cases reported from Khurda district in the last 24 hours, 24 are from Bhubaneswar.
(Edited By Bikram Keshari Jena)
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