Bhilwara no epicentre, no new Covid-19 case for 4th day in a row

NEW DELHI: Bhilwara did not report any new case of Covid-19 for the third successive day on Thursday, a signal that the textile manufacturing hub which had emerged as the epicentre of the disease in Rajasthan with 26 confirmed cases and two deaths may have turned the corner. “Bhilwara has not reported a case since March 30,” said a senior official from the state health department. Besides, eight people out of the 26 infected in Bhilwara have been cured.
The improvement comes after a strict curfew was imposed and a door-to-door survey was done to screen 2.5 million persons for any symptoms of the infection while 6,445 people were put in home isolation. From Friday, the district is imposing a “maha (mega)-curfew” of 10 days till April 13, during which people will be strictly barred from stepping out of their homes. The district administration has made arrangements for supplying all essentials such as ration and milk at the doorsteps of people.

“There will be an ‘all-down’ from April 3 to 13 in Bhilwara. We want to conclusively break the chain of transmission here… all roads of colonies and localities are being sealed. This 10-day programme is vital to win the battle against coronavirus in Bhilwara,” said Bhilwara collector Rajendra Bhatt.

State headquarters Jaipur now has the highest number of positive cases at 41. According to state health authorities, police have set up check-points in nearly every lane of Bhilwara now to strictly enforce the maha-curfew over the next 10 days till the lockdown ends. State health officials said that more than 600 people have been quarantined and 30 are in isolation

The outbreak in Bhilwara came to light in March when a 52-year-old patient suffering from pneumonia died in a hospital in Jaipur. He had tested positive for Covid-19. After his death, his doctor in Bhilwara and many others in the hospital also tested positive for the infection. Among these, 17 positive cases are the hospital staff, three are patients from the in-patient department of the hospital and five others are the contacts of these cases.

Before being diagnosed, these doctors examined more than 5,000 outdoor patients and about 600 indoor patients. "Contact tracing of all these people has been done and they are under surveillance,” said a state government official.
To contain the spread, the state is now upping the ante. Director general of police Bhupendra Yadav, who has toured the entire district to take stock of the maha-curfew arrangements, said no fresh positive case in the past three days was a major development. Only 83 reports of suspected patients were pending after 1,385 out of 1,494 test reports came out negative for coronavirus, he said.