While Chennai has been stumbling to revive back to normalcy and to fix the broken economy in the wake of the soaring high COVID-19 cases and the lockdown aftermath of the outbreak, a street that lies in the limits of the city has now become a model for the entire Chennai on how it can subdue and flatten the COVID-19 curve.

Triplicane's V R Pillai street in the city has become a containment zone free street after reporting no new cases for 14 straight days and it has posed a model for the city on countering back to the pandemic amid settling down for the 'new normal'. V R Pillai street sits on Triplicane, which is known for the dense population. 

According to the reports, the street was one of the active and major clusters in the city, and in early May, the street had reported about 50 cases and the numbers nearly got doubled in the following week. It was demarcated as the containment zone on April 27 and last week, the street was unmapped from the list of containment zones after it has reported the recovery of all the affected patients and no new case for 14 days.

The street stretched for 1.2 kilometers and a volunteer who distributed food and relief materials for the local residents in the containment zones of the city was identified to be the prime source of the infection in the street following which it has reported more cases becoming as the hotspot and the street has recorded 88 positive cases. 

According to the zonal officer, all 88 patients have cured and got discharged from the hospitals, and with the strict implementation of the guidelines, containment norms, co-operation from people, and police, the street has no new cases. He stated that the authorities in the containment area had stayed vigil to contain the spread and the street was deployed with one staff member each for 50 households to monitor the people closely and ascertain whether they have developed the positive symptoms.

The doctors at the street had checked people who had shown symptoms to ensure that they don't become a COVID-19 carrier. At the police front, police personnel had restricted the movement of people and ensured that the residents are not required to hop out of the containment barricades. The reports stated that the authorities had installed the temporary sanitation facilities in the street after finding that the residents face an issue with the public toilets.

The authorities had kept airing regular announcements about the safety and relief measures through drones and robots and they went on to make the residents understand that the reporting of a single case would keep their entire community under the containment zone and the police department has also grouped the volunteers to co-ordinate with the frontline workers to curb the spread.

After staying under the containment zone with nearly one month, V R Pillai street has come out of the restrictions and became a model of the entire city on how it can flatten the curve and come out of the crisis. The co-operation from the government authorities, police personnel, and people would eventually pay off and in this case, this mechanism has paid off. V R Pillai street comes under division 120 in Zone 9 Teynampet which, as of Tuesday morning, has reported 1770 cases.