After enjoying a status of being the only Indian state with no active CoVid-19 case for a few days, Mizoram is now back to being an infected state again, after 12 people were tested positive late last night.
All 12 of them are recent returnees, with 10 from Delhi batch and 2 from Kolkata batch according to DIPR tweet. "All of them had been quarantined at their designated Quarantine Centres upon their arrival in Mizoram, so there is no need for panic," assured DIPR in another tweet.
My cousin Dr. Mash too left immediately this morning for ZMC Hospital, Falkawn, the only hospital in Mizoram designated to treat CoVid-19 patients.
And now, she'll be at ZMC indefinitely until everybody's cured. Will the size of the dedicated CoVid-19 medical team be increased now that there is 12 times the number of patient they had initially treated? Will the number of beds in the ICU and Isolation ward along with ventilators be increased? I guess we'll know those answers soon enough in the next few days.
Meanwhile, for the medical team at ZMC, this means getting back to a life of complete isolation from the outside world. This also means reverting back to their daily grind of working in uncomfortable PPE suits for hours within a contagious environment.
If you're interested, you can read about what the nurses and doctors of ZMC go through every day in this post - ZMC CoVid-19 Warriors (though this was written back when they had just one positive patient, things will be much more hectic now as there are currently 12 patients).
In spite of all that, when I walked into Mash's bedroom this morning, she was all prepped up and ready to fight the battle for all of us again. Her bags were packed and ready to go.
She didn't have much luggage at all for an indefinite stay at ZMC, and she said this was because most of her stuff was still at the hospital as they knew this day would eventually come...
And so we bid her a sad and uncertain goodbye as her colleague, Dr. NTa Sailo, Respiratory Medicine Specialist, came to pick her up.
Bye bye Mash! Stay safe.
Everything felt so surreal, how things could change so drastically in just a couple of hours. Just last night, we were celebrating Mash's birthday with a cake and small family dinner, having our small share of fun and relaxation, completely oblivious of the tsunami ahead.
Now that the CoVid-19 wards of ZMC are functioning again, let us remember to keep all of them in our prayers. Meanwhile, the best we can do to flatten the curve is to obey all rules implemented by the government and LLTF.
As the DC of Kolasib stated this morning, there is absolutely no reason for anybody to panic as all 11 people tested positive are from the same Thingdawl Polytechnic Quarantine Facility, and they had all been following all quarantine guidelines right down to the letter. Their beds and rooms had been sealed off from the rest of the inmates and staff of the Quarantine facility, and Contact Tracing had been completed. Moreover, a 5 KM radius from the Quarantine facility had been declared a Containment Zone and the National Highway leading to the place had been blocked.
Still, the after-shock of this grave news was noticeable even here in my locality. For instance, all shops were ordered to close down immediately this morning at 6 AM from our locality loudspeakers. LLTF members patrolled the streets to make sure people were following this rule. The roads were deserted in just a few minutes as everybody read the news about our new positive patients.
On a comical side though, our locality crier [read more about the town criers of Mizoram here] did lighten up the mood this morning by announcing some funny stuff, like for instance, he said, "In our Mizo community, it is a common practice for our elders to tell us to go and buy this or that from a shop outside. We obey them dutifully because that is our Mizo way of life, our zonunmawi. However, right now, it is ok to say no to such errands." :D
Also, he tried announcing in Hindi, lolz. I guess the person who was supposed to announce in Hindi hadn't reached the office yet, he started off slowly... "Bahar mat jao" and then there was a long silence and then he continued in a very low-key tone, "Ghar jao". :D :D
With 12 people positive so far, let us keep our fingers crossed that the numbers do not increase. But at the same time, as I mentioned in my previous update, let us be prepared to expect the worst as we still have our brothers and sisters returning home every day.
Today, the train from Maharashtra carrying our fellow Mizos from Mumbai and Pune is bound to arrive. Due to the railway track repair work going on at Badarpur-Lumding section, they will disembark at Guwahati instead of Bairabi, and will continue their journey on buses [source].
Let us continue to keep them in our prayers too, as they had already been through a terrible ordeal, from over-crowded compartments to a tragic death in the form of an accident. On top of all that, they are coming from a state with the highest infection in India, so the chances of more people testing positive are quite high.
I hope I can update better news in the coming days. Only time will tell. Until then, see you all, folks. God bless you all.
