NITI Aayog has recently released a compendium of practices from states and union territories that details information about various initiatives implemented by states, districts, and cities in India for containing and managing the Covid-19 outbreak.

The compendium was released by NITI Aayog Member Dr VK Paul, CEO Amitabh Kant and Additional Secretary Dr Rakesh Sarwal.

In preparing the compendium of practices, NITI Aayog reached out to all states and union territories by email and telephonically, requesting them to share any practices that they believe had been useful for Covid-19 mitigation and management. Additional information was provided by some states during review meetings with Member (Health), NITI Aayog. Sourcing of information directly from states/UTs was supplemented with a comprehensive literature review.

The practices in the compendium have been disaggregated under six sections: (i) public health and clinical response (ii) governance mechanisms (iii) digital health (iv) integrated model (v) welfare of migrants and other vulnerable groups (vi) other practices. A summary of the relevant Government of India guidelines has been included for theaforementioned categories, wherever applicable.

Practices adopted by states/UTs in the fight against Covid-19 range from the preparation of comprehensive route maps for contact tracing to the operationalization of mobile vans for testing and providing essential health services to the doorsteps of people. Technology has been leveraged extensively by several states and UTs,including the use of robots for delivering food, water, and medicines to patients in hospitals as well as training health personnel using virtual platforms.