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| COVID-19 testing poorly managed, alleges Shopkeepers’ Association Poonch | | Health Dept fails to conduct testing of more than 50 persons a day | |  RAJESH TANDON
EARLY TIMES REPORT
POONCH, Aug 8: Shopkeepers’ Association Poonch strongly criticized the District Administration Poonch for not putting in place proper arrangements before issuing the order for conducting COVID-19 testing of shopkeepers and other manpower engaged in the business establishments which can be gauged from the fact that the Health Department has failed to manage the crowd of testing. Several shopkeepers of the town alleged that the issue is mishandled by the authorities, adding that when District Administration Poonch, made COVID-19 testing of all shop owners and their staff mandatory. “The district administration ordered that without COVID-19 test no shop will be allowed to open until the shopkeepers and their staff is not given a card certifying that they are COVID-19 negative.
The order directed them to get the test conducted in District Hospital Poonch. But, unfortunately the hospital was not able to handle the huge rush of shopkeepers as it lacks adequate arrangements,” they said. They said that as soon as the district administration ordered, all shopkeepers thronged the District Hospital (DH) for the test. The numbers were in hundreds but shockingly hospital authorities conducted tests of only 50 persons and said that it can’t exceed this limit due to which all shopkeepers had to return, which created resentment among them. After this attitude of the DH authorities, the shopkeepers staged a strong protest demonstration against the CMO, Medical Superintendent for their mismanagement.
“At one hand District Administration says that without test, shops will not be allowed to open and on the other hand DH has not been conducting tests of more than 50 people and in this way tests will not be completed in weeks to come and ultimately, shopkeepers, who had already suffered huge losses in recent months will not be able to run their businesses. Administration should have made proper arrangements for bulk testing,” said Dr Sukhvinder Singh, Mintu, and Naveen Sharma, owners of business establishments.
Shopkeepers’ Association raised a finger on the mismanagement of DH authorities and said that there are no adequate arrangements in hospital for protection. “There was a sanitizing tunnel, when LG had visited the hospital but after that the tunnel has been lying defunct,” they alleged.
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