AP stands first in COVID-19 tests

Amaravati: With an average of 1504 COVID 19 tests per one million population, Andhra Pradesh tops the country on that count and the state government is gearing up to set up Virology labs in all the districts.

This was revealed in a review meeting held here on Tuesday, chaired by Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy. Briefing the COVID-19 situation in the state, the officials told Chief Minister that 82 positive cases have been recorded in the past 24 hours and a total of 80,334 tests have been conducted so far.

While the national average in terms of positives cases recorded is 4.13 percent and the state average is 1.57 percent. The average death rate of the country is 3.19 percent and the state average is 2.46 percent. All these cases are from containment zones, officials told Chief Minister and added that they are gearing up to set up labs in Srikakulam, Prakasam, and Nellore districts and labs would also come up at Vizianagaram and West Godavari districts.

To those who are suffering from mild symptoms and seeking home isolation, the central health ministry has released the guidelines to be followed. The state government’s YSR Telemedicine is being successful and medicines supply to the patients are being intensified by using the technology.

Meanwhile, the Chief Minister has sought details on agriculture sector operations in the state such as the purchase of maize, paddy, and  bengal gram. He enquired about the issues being faced by orange and banana farmers. For the same, officials told that the marketing department is intervening where ever required to resolve the issues. 

There is a shortage of mother shrimps due to international market conditions. With concern to this, Chief Minister ordered Minister Mopidevi Venkataramana to monitor the situation. The officials said that several issues have been cleared in Agri processing units with orders from the Chief Minister and paddy sales are being stabilized with the farm gate marketing system.

Chief Minister made it clear to the officials to intervene where ever the farmers are facing the issues and resolve those. 

Minister Mopidevi Venkataramana, Chief Secretary Nilam Sawhney, and DGP Gautam Sawang were among those present at the review meeting along with Special Chief Secretary Jawahar Reddy through video conference.