As many as 10,823 stranded Indian citizens from Karnataka, who will be repatriated from different countries, will undergo mandatory quarantine for 14 days on arrival.
The department of health and family welfare in Karnataka has put in place a standard operating procedure (SOP) for screening, testing and quarantining of foreign returnees, who will be landing in the Bengaluru or Mangaluru airports, or at the Karwar or Mangaluru seaport.
With the Centre deciding to bring back Indian citizens stranded abroad, the state government has prepared a list of 10,823 people from Karnataka, with around 6,100 to be flown in early and on priority based on their health and financial condition.
“The list of foreign returnees includes tourists and visitors (4,408), students (3,074), migrants and professionals (2,784) and ship crew (557). The first batch to Karnataka will start on May 8,” said COVID-19 spokesperson S. Suresh Kumar.
The state will receive the first batch of 6,100 persons from United Arab Emirates (2,575), Saudi Arabia (957), United States of America (927), Qatar (414) and Canada (328) early. They will be screened at the point of entry using thermal scanners and pulse oximeter reading. They will be categorised into three groups—A (symptomatic on arrival with fever, cold, cough, chill, headache, sore throat, fatigue, shortness of breath, body pain, diarrhoea, chest pain, recent loss of taste and smell); B (asymptomatic but with co-morbidities like hypertension, diabetes mellitus, asthma, lung diseases, history of organ transplant, cancer, liver, heart and kidney diseases); and C (Asymptomatic healthy individuals).
“All three categories of passengers will undergo mandatory RT-PCR testing on arrival, and COVID (hand) stamping, and they will be required to download surveillance apps like Arogya Setu, Quarantine Watch and Apthamitra. All three groups will be tested thrice—on arrival, on the 7th and 12th days,” said health commissioner Pankaj Kumar Pandey.
As per the SOP, passengers under category A will be shifted to designated COVID Healthcare Centre for 14-day institutional quarantine, followed by 14 days of reporting period.
The category B will be quarantined in designated hotels for seven days, and if the second test is negative, they will be sent home. They will be tested again on the 12th day. The category C will be kept under home quarantine for 14 days, where they have to update a selfie every hour on the app with Google coordinates to report to the quarantine call centre.
The home-quarantined people are expected to call the Apthamitra helpline if they develop COVID-19 symptoms at any point of time.
