Delhi reports 59 new +ve cases in last 24 hrs; total rises to 445
NEW DELHI: The number of Coronavirus cases has risen to 445 in Delhi but the situation is under control and there has been no community transmission, Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal said on Saturday.
There were 40 cases of local transmission while a majority of other patients either had foreign travel history or were recently evacuated from Nizamuddin Markaz, he said.
Sharing the data, he said 59 new cases came in last 24 hours in the national Capital. Among all the patients who have Coronavirus, around 11 are in ICU and five are on ventilators.
“We can say that this is local transmission and not community transmission,” he said.
In community transmission, people do not get to know from whom they are getting infected but right now no such case has occurred in Delhi, he said, adding the situation is under control.
“We have found 2,300 people from the Markaz. Among these people, 500 are admitted to various hospitals and around 1,800 are in quarantine. We are testing all the people which means the number of COVID-19 positive cases in Delhi will increase,” he said.
He said that till now Delhi has witnessed six deaths due to Coronavirus. “Among these six people, five were above 60 and one person was 36 years old. Among these six people, three were from Markaz,” he said.
Among the six deceased, five people had other serious diseases.
One person had liver disease, one person had sugar, two persons had a respiratory disease and one person had heart ailment, he said.
He requested all citizens who are above 55 years of age to stay indoors and be cautious.
“All the senior citizens are very precious us and I do not want any of them to suffer. I will also request the people who have serious diseases to be very cautious because coronavirus can be lethal for them,” he said.
Kejriwal said he is personally monitoring the situation in the national Capital and has record of every person affected by Coronavirus.
“Right now our top priority is to ensure that there should not be any community spread of Coronavirus and the second one is if somebody is affected by Coronavirus then the person should get the best treatment and no death should happen in Delhi,” he said. Kejriwal said due to the Nizamuddin incident and as Delhi already has many foreign patients, the number of coronavirus patients has suddenly increased.
“Right now we urgently need PPE (personal protective equipment) kits and we have already written to the central government about it yesterday.
“I do not want the doctors and nurses to work without the protective gear but the centre is yet to provide us with these kits. I will request the Centre to provide us with PPE kits urgently,” he said.
The CM said that on Friday the Delhi government had distributed lunch to around 6,63,928 people and dinner to around 6,78,544 people.
The Delhi government has the arrangement to feed more than 10 lakh people, he said.
“I am happy to say that many NGOS and religious organisations are also distributing food to needy people. “I will request everyone to ensure that not a single person in Delhi should stay hungry,” he said.
The Delhi government has already announced it will give 7.5 kg free ration to 71 lakh people who have ration cards.
There are around 6.50 lakh people who have earlier applied for the ration card but did not get it and the government has decided to give these people also the benefit of free ration, he said.
Kejriwal said they have introduced the registration process to ensure that a single person doesn’t queue up many times to get ration.
“From yesterday nearly 40 to 50,000 people have already registered and I will request others also to register soon. I will request the people who know how to handle internet and computer to help these poor people to register.”
Meanwhile, the final COVID-19 sample collection of 263 people, evacuated recently from Italy and now staying at
an ITBP quarantine facility, has been done and results are expected soon, a senior official said on Saturday.
Another batch of 217 people, who too were brought back from Milan city in Italy and admitted to this facility on March 15, has been found negative for COVID-19, he said.
Chief Secretary Vijay Dev, has ordered for opening up of additional food centers to provide cooked food as Lunch and Dinner to homeless/deprived/ poor or distressed persons. 72 NGOS and 168 other philanthropic organizations have been roped in for distribution of food. Till Thursday, 1,786 food Centers including stationary hunger relief camps and mobile distribution centres were being run.
Earlier in the day, Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, deputy CM and Education minister Manish Sisodia on Saturday held an interactive session with parents through social media platforms, on “parenting in the time of Coronavirus”. With schools shut due to the pandemic, it is a
challenge for most parents who are working from home to keep their children constructively occupied in a holistic environment and keep them safe.
“There are 44 lakh students who are not going to school now and have many questions about COVID-19. I will answer as many questions as I can. Children are innocent. Most of them, specially the very young ones do not understand the significance of a lockdown or why they are being asked to stay at home. The aim of this session is to suggest ideas on how to utilize this time fruitfully,” Kejriwal said.
Kejriwal said, “Children are energetic, they want to go out and play, but all their activities have stopped because of the lockdown. I can understand that they must be having questions on Coronavirus and the lockdown. Following our announcement yesterday on ‘Parenting in the times of Corona’ broadcast, we have got interesting questions from the parents and children.”