Farmers Movement Archive

Virus spread creates new record in Haryana

The number of coronavirus infected patients in Haryana went through the roof last week (April 12-18) with the state reporting a record high of 40,090 new infections. This is more than double the numbers reported the week before. The virus trajectory which started climbing 10 weeks ago had already reached an apex level the week before (April 5-11) with 18,748 fresh infections. Before the two new records in terms of highest number of weekly infections were set in the past fortnight, the highest number of cases during the last surge was 17,426 infections reported between November 16 and 22. The surge has also pushed the number of active cases to 45,363. The state also reported 147 deaths last week even though the case fatality rate was below 1%. As per health department statistics, the sample positivity rate jumped to 5.23% in the last week as compared to 4.82% the week before and the recovery rate dropped to 87.22% from 91.96%. National capital region (NCR) districts — Gurugram with around 12,000 active infections, Faridabad with around 5,500 active infections, Sonepat with over 3,400 infections were the major contributors to the tally. Karnal with over 3,100 active infections, Hisar with over 2,700 active cases, Panchkula with over 2,100 cases and Ambala with around 2,000 active cases also caused concern among health authorities, officials said. Additional chief secretary, health, Rajeev Arora said that they are stepping up sampling and vaccination at Singhu and Tikri borders where a large number of farmers have assembled. “Also, we are going to conduct RT-PCR tests on those returning from Kumbh at three locations – Kala Amb, Yamunanagar and Karnal near the UP borders,’’ Arora said. Vaccination crosses 3 million mark Health officials said around 32 lakh individuals have been vaccinated and the authorities were sampling 2 lakh peopel every week. “We are planning to further step up the vaccination drive in the coming days,’’ said an official. Panipat enters critical category, Jhajjar exits desirable Panipat district with a sample positivity rate of 6% has entered the critical category, joining four other districts -Faridabad (9.05%), Gurugram (7.51%), Panchkula (6.77%) and Rewari (6.38%). Officials said Ambala with a positivity rate of 5.82% and Karnal with a positivity rate 5.68% are fast-approaching the critical positivity mark of over 6%. With Jhajjar making an exit from the desirable positivity rate category, only two districts- Nuh (0.83%) and Charkhi Dadri (1.17%) now have a desirable positivity rate of less than 2%.

Hindustan Times

20-04-2021

Chandigarh