The Jharkhand health department has asked all 24 district administrations to constitute a six-member team of doctors and nurses to undergo training in managing neonatal intensive care units (NICU) and paediatrics intensive care units (PICU) for treating children with severe Covid-19 symptoms, officials said on Tuesday, explaining that the decision was taken in view of a possible third wave of infections.

The team in each district will comprise two child specialist doctors, two medical officers and two staff nurses, Dr Siddharth Tripathi, the nodal officer of health department’s IEC, said. Once the districts send in names of team members, the government will start training programmes for the teams to ensure that each district has trained manpower for managing ICUs for children, he added.

“Intensive care facilities for adults and children are different, and we need to ensure that each district has caregivers trained to treat children who are admitted in NICUs and PICUs,” Tripathi said.

National Health Mission (NHM) Director Ravi Shankar Shukla addressed a letter to chief medical officers of all districts recently and asked them to send a list of team members by Tuesday. The training programme, as per the letter, will be conducted online as well as offline.

“It is feared that the third wave of Covid-19 might affect people in the age bracket of 2 to 18 years, and it is imperative to prepare for this wave well in advance,” the letter stated.

While there is no data available on how many children have been infected by the Coronavirus in Jharkhand so far, the Intensive Public Health Survey (IPHS) being carried out by the state government found that at least 28 of the 776 people who tested positive for Covid-19 during the ongoing survey were children.

As per data shared by the health department, at least 25 of the 28 children were in the age bracket of six to 18 years, one was in the age bracket of two to five years and two in the age bracket of zero to one year.

It is feared that the third wave of Covid-19 may affect around 7 lakh children and at least 9,000 of them may need intensive care. Jharkhand, however, has only 125 child specialists and is focusing on training more doctors and nurses to treat children, officials said.

Apprhending a third wave, the Jharkhand government has set up special ICUs for children in various government and private hospitals and also strengthened the infrastructure for child care at medical facilities. The state recently held its first national level webinar to prepare for the third wave keeping in mind that it would have an impact on children.