More Tablighi returnees test +ve for COVID-19 in southern states

CHENNAI: Most southern states continued to witness surge in their respective COVID19 numbers for the second day in a row on Thursday, with a majority of the infected being returnees from the Tablighi Jamaat congregation in a New Delhi locality last month, officials said.

Governments in Tamil Nadu, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka, among the badly affected with virtually all of the new patients having link with the Nizammudin West event in Delhi, stepped up efforts to identify all those who participated in the religious meet and screen them.

With 75 new cases –all but one had taken part in the Tablighi event, Tamil Nadu on Thursday moved ahead of Kerala (256 active cases) to the second spot in the country with a total of 309 COVID-19 patients behind Maharashtra (416).

On Wednesday, Tamil Nadu had reported a whopping 110 people, all returnees from the jamat event, testing positive. Among the 21 fresh positive cases reported from Kerala on Thursday, two had attended the Nizamuddin congregation.

Twenty-seven fresh cases of Coronavirus were confirmed in Telangana on Thursday, taking the tally in the state to 154 with the active cases at 128, state Health Minister E Rajender said. The state has seen the most fatalities with the COVID-19 toll rising to nine in the state late on Wednesday with the death of three more persons who returned from the Delhi congregation. All the nine deceased had a history of attending the religious meeting at Nizamuddin in south Delhi.

Altogether, 17 people had been discharged. The Karnataka government reported 14 new COVID-19 cases, including ten men, who had attended the Tablighi congregation, and a woman who had contact with a Delhi returnee, on Thursday, taking the total to 124.