A decision to this effect was taken at a meeting of the State Disaster Management Authority here to evolve measures to prevent spread of the infection in the Union Territory.
Later, speaking to reporters, Chief Minister V Narayanasamy said as directed by the Centre, all the private medical colleges here should open facilities to test swabs of people to identify prevalence of COVID-19.
He said it was decided at the meeting that the government run Indira Gandhi Medical college hospital and also the Centrally administered JIPMER should augment the number of tests they were conducting.
The government-run medical college hospital would function in three shifts while JIPMER should have facilities to test 1,000 swabs a day as the pandemic had been spreading fast here.
Both these government run hospitals whould function in a coordinated manner, the Chief Minister said.
It was also resolved to increase the manpower in the government hospitals conducting tests.
The other decisions taken at the meeting included closing the entire beach road for the next 10 days, shifting the Goubert Market dealing in vegetables from the present site to the new bus terminal in Orleanpeth Monday and all shops and establishments would remain open from 6 a.m. to 2 p.m. COR ROH ROH