A plea has been moved in Delhi High Court challenging Delhi Lieutenant Governor l Baijal's order mandating five-day institutional quarantine for all COVID-19 patients under home quarantine in the national capital.
The petition, moved by advocate Nancy Roy, is likely to be heard next week.
The plea said that such harsh directions forcing patients to undergo five-day institutional quarantine, especially when the government is unable to provide an adequate number of beds and nurses to patients who are in dire need of hospitalization, will have disastrous effects.
It said that such compulsory institutional quarantine is likely to deter people from getting themselves tested for the fear of being sent to government-run quarantine centers.
"More and more beds will be required for these institutional quarantine cases whereas extremely sick patients in dire need of beds may be left unattended and without beds. This will overburden isolation centers which are unhygienic and lead to further spread of infection," the plea said.
It said that elderly people will be put to hardship both physically and mentally.
Owing to the urgency of the matter where the implementation of such harsh measures will lead to total chaos and shortage of beds in hospitals, the petitioner said that he is filing the present petition in the interest of public seeking immediate quashing of the order dated June 19 issued by the Delhi Disaster Management Authority.
The office of the Lieutenant Governor of Delhi and Delhi Disaster Management Authority (DDMA) had made physical verification of each case under home isolation mandatory to be carried out by surveillance team officers under the supervision of District Magistrate.
Additionally, the said office order has made it mandatory for COVID positive cases to undergo five days of institutional quarantine.
The plea said that the Delhi government has already issued press releases to the effect that the entire manpower of the Delhi government is already stretched, and they will have to make large quarantine centers for housing thousands of asymptomatic patients.
( With inputs from ANI )