Police efforts to enforce lockdown in Kerala's Kasaragod bears fruit
On March 31, the number of COVID-19 cases in Kasargod hadtouched 106.
They became 164 on April 6 and now in the last six daysonly 14 cases have been reported, a significant drop in thenumber of cases in the district.
"It was possible only because of our containmentstrategy.
Basically our strategy was based on three locks-- Lock 1,Lock 2, and Lock 3 to ensure that the people do not mix up andinfection does not spread,"Sakhare, who is the commissionerof Kochi city police told .
Taking the charge as special officer, the InspectorGeneral rank officer enforced three locks in the district inline with the lockdown measures taken by the central and stategovernments to arrest the spread of the deadly virus there.
The locks were put as part of a three-pronged strategy tocompletely isolate the persons who were primary and secondarycontacts of the COVID-19 positive persons came from abroad,particularly Gulf countries, Sakhare said.
"Lock 1 was implemented doing traditional policingmethods like road block and mobile patrolling and all.
Through this measure we were able to control the peoplecoming out of their homes", he said.
The second strategy was implementation of Lock 2,creating a Geographical Infromation System, mapping all thepositive cases, all home quarantined persons, all theexpatriates who came from the foreign countries and primaryand secondary contacts of the positive persons. "Very interesting picture emerged. We saw that all thepositive cases are concentrated only in seven areas of thedistrict spread over five police stations.
We isolated those areas by cordoning them off. All roadsleading to the areas were blocked and nobody was allowed to goin or come out," the IPS officer said.
The police then put the third lock, declaring the sevenareas as Covid Containment Zones to isolate the worst-affectedplaces from rest of the district.
Based on the inputs that COVID-19 positive persons whocame from abroad had stayed at their homes, met their friendsand mingled with family members, the police included all ofthem in the list of primary contacts and secondary contacts.
"After identifying these contacts, we put them under theThird Lock.
They were locked in isolation using technology as well astraditional policing methods," Sakhare said.
"As part of the third lock, we put police guards in frontof their homes. We created a beat patrol policing covering 10to 12 houses of the affected persons.
Visiting their homes, the police personnel educated thepeople on importance of staying their homes", he said.
Besides, all the houses, where the primary and secondarycontacts resided were brought under the drone surveillance,Sakhare said.
He said COVID-19 safety apps were also installed in thephones of the primary and secondary contacts.
"If somebody tries to leave his home, then we get analert. In that case, we go and shift such people to governmentquarantine facilities besides initiating legal actions againstthem.
Three days after implementing the third lock, we havemoved 107 people into government quarantines because theiractions were dangerous to the society.
The app was installed in the phones of over 10,700 homequarantined people," the officer said. The district police launched home delivery service inCOVID containment zones to deliver essential items at thedoorsteps of the people to ensure that they remained indoor.
The door delivery programme was later extended to allparts of the district.
The police also launched a 'Kasargod Suraksha App' toprovide telemedicine to those isolated and wanted to consultwith doctors for their various ailments. The top police official said after April 14 upto April21st "we expect 12 to 14 cases only" in the district.
It will further come down to single digit by the monthend and "four weeks from now I expect the case will be zero.No report of COVID cases," he added.
Out of the 166 who were infected in the district, 73 gotcured. No fresh cases were reported on Monday. TGBROH ROH