The Maharashtra Health Minister and guardian Minister of Jalna District Rajesh Tope on Monday directed the district administration to conduct more searches and investigations in the district and try to reduce the death rate to less than one per cent.

Tope was holding a review meeting with senior district administration officers about the pandemic at the District Collector's office.

Tope said the emphasis should be on isolating all those who had come in contact with the Covid patients. Normally, 10 to 15 people in contact with an infected person are being traced but this number should increase to 20 and they are to be immediately quarantined and swab samples of these persons should be taken and sent for immediate investigation.

He also directed to ensure that the number of RT-PCR check-ups through rural hospitals and primary health centres in the district should be more than 800 per day and that all concerned authorities should upload the information of Covid infections in the district on the web portal regularly and expeditiously.

Tope added that hospitals will not be allowed to charge more than the stipulated rate. In all private hospitals, auditors have been appointed to check the payments and through them, the payments should be scrutinized. He also directed action against those hospitals, which were found to be charging higher rates in the district.

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