Bengaluru: Starting Tuesday, May 19, the Government of Karnataka is scrapping the red-orange-green colour categorisation of districts based on the number of COVID-19 infection cases. The state government, it is reported, will henceforth identify only “containment zones”, which will be monitored strictly.
Addressing the media on Monday, state Medical Education Minister Dr Sudhakar K explained that once the lockdown is lifted, the red-orange-green zone classifications will no longer be relevant. He added that the state government will, instead, strictly monitor small areas that have a high number of COVID-19 positive cases.
DH reported that the state government is also redefining what is a “containment zone”. The Minister explained that at present, a 100-meter area is confined as “containment zones”. Stating that the goverment feels that this is too much for urban areas, he said that the government might look at categorising, for example, specific apartments or buildings.
“In rural areas, the government might consider classifying entire taluks as containment zones,” he added.
Additionally, private and public transport will not be allowed in containment zones, the Minister added.
According to Chief Secretary TM Vijay Bhaskar’s order, containment zones will have house-to-house surveillance, intense contact tracing and other clinical interventions as required.
He added that taluks or wards will be categorised into red, orange and green “only for the purpose of better monitoring. These zones shall not be for the purpose of imposing any further restrictions on activities…”
Currently, there are about 126 containment zones in the state, however, this is a dynamic number as zones might be added or removed from the list based on the number of cases reported.
