229 hostel students test +ve at Washim

Two hundred and twenty-nine students of a public school hostel and four school staff in Maharashtra's Washim district have tested coronavirus positive and the area has been declared a containment zone, an official said on Thursday.

In all, 327 students from various districts in Vidarbha region reside at the hostel of the Bhavna Public School.

Earlier this week, 39 students and five employees of a hostel in Latur district of Marathwada had tested positive.

Risod tehsildar Ajit Shelar told PTI that the students had joined the Washim hostel on Februar y 14. Twenty-one students tested positive in the first few days, af ter all 327 students were subjected to RT-PCR testing, he said. On Wednesday, Maharashtra witnessed a significant rise in coronavirus cases, with more than 8,000 new infections in a single day af ter a gap of over four months, health officials said.

The state reported 8,807 cases on Wednesday, taking its total infection count to 21,21,119. It had reported 8,142 cases on October 21 last year, af ter which the numbers had been declining. With 80 deaths reported on Wednesday, the state's fatality count rose to 51,937, the official said.