Five fresh cases take state tally to 151
DEHRADUN: Five fresh Covid-19 cases with the return of migrants has taken the state tally to 151 on Friday.
Out of the five new cases, three were reported from Dehradun and two from US Nagar. Of three in Dehradun, one had returned from Delhi while another from Mumbai. The third patient is a Thalassemia patient. In US Nagar, one had returned from Delhi and another from Mumbai.
So far, 65 migrants returning to the state mostly from Mumbai, Delhi and Gurugram have tested positive.
The afternoon bulletin released by the state health department mentioned that five fresh cases had been detected taking the tally to 151 with the recovery of 56 patients including two on Friday.
The percentage of the recovery rate of COVID-19 patients has come down to 37.09% and the doubling rate has come down to eight days, according to the state health officials.
With these fresh cases, Dehradun has now 53 COVID-19 positive cases, followed by 31 in US Nagar, 28 in Nainital, 10 in Haridwar, 7 from Uttar Kashi, 6 each from Tehri Garhwal and Bageshwar, 4 each from Almora and Pauri Garhwal and one from Chamoli. Apart from these, one has tested positive at the private lab.
The state health department officials said that of these 151 cases, 94 are active. So far the state health department has sent 18,008 samples for testing including 1,175 to private labs.
The test results of 1,968 patients are awaited.
On Thursday, Uttarakhand reported the biggest single-day jump with 24 new COVID-19 positive cases.
Authorities in Uttarakhand are worried over spike in cases with the return of the migrants. According to government officials, over 2.35 lakh registrations for return to Uttarakhand had been made on the state website. Of these, the state government under its evacuation process has so far brought back over 1,29,166 people through trains and buses.
Uttarakhand high court while terming the situation with regard to migrants returning to state testing positive for COVID-19 as “absolutely alarming”, had directed the state government on Tuesday to procure rapid test kits immediately and start testing on experimental basis at the border points. The HC order stressed that “Presently the efforts which are being made by the State authorities, particularly at the borders of Uttarakhand, are not sufficient to check the return of persons, who are coming more rapidly in ever-increasing numbers. We are afraid many of them may be infected with the virus. We say this as admittedly COVID-19 positive cases have been detected in far-flung places ...and many interior hill districts. All this has happened after opening up after the lockdown. This situation is absolutely alarming..We are not against the arrival of the people. Our only concern is that in these difficult times there must be a proper screening at the borders”.