Coronavirus: Experts say no to institutional quarantine

Institutional quarantine is not a good idea, say the experts in the Covid-19 advisory committee who warn that healthy individuals may contract the virus at such facilities.

The fact that more than 40% of patients in Karnataka are those from quarantine centres is enough, they say.

Sources said the government will issue an order giving powers to respective districts to determine the duration of institutional quarantine, depending on the influx of travellers. For example, Hassan insists on 14 days' institutional quarantine for Maharashtra returnees, whereas according to the state SOP, it is seven days.

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Dr Giridhar Babu, a member of the Covid-19 expert committee, said, "We should limit institutional quarantine facilities to only those who don't have homes. We should home quarantine everyone who can afford it. I have said at every meeting that institutional quarantine is the reason for the infection spreading faster."

The healthy are getting infected from a few in quarantine, he added.

Another member of the expert committee said on condition of anonymity that it's mostly the symptomatic who infect others. "One can safely be sent home as long as one is checked for symptoms everyday. It's been a month since the Union government issued guidelines that the mildly symptomatic and pre-symptomatic can be treated at home. But we are still dilly-dallying on sending asymptomatics and contacts home."

People in quarantine centres become Covid-19 suspects only if they show symptoms. If they have merely come from virus-affected areas and are healthy, they are contacts. "We can take swab samples of those who have symptoms. The state decided not to follow the revised discharge policy of the Centre because of sufficient hospital beds, but that theory should be applicable to hospitals and not to those in quarantine centres," he said.

Under the given circumstances, if a person is asymptomatic, 14 days' home quarantine is the best option. "We can send the person home with instructions to stay away from others," he added.

In BBMP and other urban areas, a home quarantine poster is stuck on the door. Information is given to two neighbours and resident welfare /apartment owners' associations to ensure strict enforcement, which is also monitored by a three-member booth level team. A flying squad also filed FIRs against those who violate home quarantine and shifts them to institutional quarantine.