Mask will be made mandatory depending on surge in Covid cases: TN minister

Tamil Nadu Health Minister Ma Subramanian on Monday said that masks will be made compulsory in the state only if there is a surge in Covid-19 cases.

The minister told reporters that "the current wave of Covid -19 need not be feared at all as it was a milder version of the earlier ones".

The minister said this while interacting with the mediapersons after inspecting the Covid mock drill at the Rajiv Gandhi Government General Hospital.

Asked why the state was not insisting on Covid-19 protocols, while some other states have already implemented them, the minister said: "In Tamil Nadu, the number of daily cases has touched only 350 while in other states it has touched 500 and hence such a decision would be taken based on the surge in cases."

"If cases rise, we will definitely look into norms related to making masks mandatory ,especially in public places," he added.

Ma Subramanian told reporters that daily cases were rising slowly in the state at the rate of 10 or 20 increase per day.

The minister said if Tamil Nadu witnesses a surge like that of Kerala or Maharashtra, Covid-19 norms would be implemented in public places.

He further said that a majority of those who are getting infected by Covid-19 are in home isolation, adding "very few are being hospitalised".

He also said that there has not been a single case of admission to the ICU or usage of Oxygen beds.

The minister, however, said 64,281 beds are prepared for any eventuality, adding a total of 33,664 were Oxygen-supported beds, 22,820 non-oxygen beds, and 7,797 intensive care unit beds.

He said that the state's liquid oxygen storage capacity stood at 2,067 metric tonnes.

The minister said there are 342 RT-PCR testing centres in the state.

He also said that Tamil Nadu has the capacity to test 3 lakh people a day but was testing only 4,000 people and would soon be hiked to 11,000 a day.