The fear of community spread in the local populace for any part of India has been a scary thought given the magnitude at which Coronavirus has wreaked havoc. When the first signs of a case at Dharavi, Asia’s biggest slum surfaced there was utter pandemonium. On April 1, Dharavi, reported a positive case in a 56-year old man and what followed was sheer panic.
By the time one could say Jack Robinson, the city of dreams had already recorded 181 positive cases and nine deaths. With the largest slum cluster in Asia no one wanted to take a chance. But as the virus spread, so did the Corona grip on Dharavi.
Doctors at Dharavi who recorded the first cases knew that if it spreads across the wide expanse of Dharavi, the consequences could be catastrophic. The team of Mahim Dharavi Medical Practitioners Association and a team of Indian Medical Association (IMA) with 25 doctors launched a 10 day mission to roam around hotspot zones testing thousands of residents.
Joining hands with this professional team was the Mumbai Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation helping isolate and quarantine possible cases. The BMC ensured supply of free personal protective equipment (PPE) kits to private doctors boosting confidence to open clinics shut since March.
In April only two or three clinics were open in Dhavari. But as time progressed a 100 clinics opened up. This gave strength to detect more cases.
Hard work and commitment has seen the number of cases go down since late May. Even as average new cases have reduced from 47 in May to 27 in June, the doubling rate has gone up to 44 days against 21 as of May 24. Dharavi till now reported 1,964 cases and 73 deaths, while 939 people have recovered from the disease says a media report.
Kiran Dighavkar, assistant municipal commissioner of G-North ward, which Dharavi falls under has bee quoted in the media saying, “Our aggressive testing and screening of people through fever clinics helped in tackling this challenge. We identified people using common toilets and home quarantined them too.” Thousand of volunteers joined the BMC officials and doctors to test, trace and isolate.
Reportedly six lakh people have been screened in Dharavi, which has a population of nearly 8.5 lakh.
In the absence of testing kits, the doctors’ team decided to use oximetres to check oxygen level among the ones being tested.
The biggest challenge was many had 80-85% of oxygenation and were unaware of any health issue.
The exodus of migrant labours and creation of quarantine centres within Dharavi also supported the efforts of authorities in containing the spread of coronavirus.
Dharavi may have seen nearly 2-2.5 lakh migrant labourers leave the slum clusters after the lockdown was announced in March. This helped the decongesting efforts.
Dharavi is Asia’s largest slum, spread over 613 hectares and comprising of single or multi-storey houses located in narrow lanes. It is one of the most densely populated areas in the world, with over 3.6 lakh people per sq. km. The World Health Organization has said that it is very possible that the outbreak of the Coronavirus can be contained even as there are reports that the number of cases have doubled in the past six weeks.
Chief of the WHO, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has said that examples were Italy, Spain, South Korea and India’s biggest slum Dharavi which show no matter how bad an outbreak, the virus might still be reined in through aggressive action.
Speaking at a virtual presser in Geneva, Tedros said that “In the last six weeks cases have more than doubled.”
Dharavai is a densely packed area in the megacity of Mumbai which is strongly being studied for the focus on community engagement and basics of testing, tracing, isolating and treating those who are sick in a bid to break the chain of transmission to suppress the virus.
As of date the novel Coronavirus has killed nearly 555,000 people worldwide since the outbreak emerged in China last December.
Nearly 12.3 million cases have been registered in 196 countries and territories. Tedros said, “from countries where there is exponential growth, to places that are loosening restrictions and now starting to see cases rise, humanity is at test.
Comments