On a day the number of fresh Covid-19 infections shot up by 79 per cent in 24 hours, mayor Firhad Hakim declared that Kolkata Municipal Corporation will mark out 17 containment zones in different parts of the city.
West Bengal, which is witnessing a sudden spurt in Covid-19 cases from the beginning of this week, recorded 3,451 infections on Friday with Kolkata alone accounting for 1,954 or 56 per cent of these, a health department bulletin said.
The positivity rate went up to 8.46 per cent from 5.47 per cent on Thursday, while the number of daily tests went up from Thursday’s 38,898 to 40,813 on Friday, it said.
The bulletin said that seven persons died on Friday of the virus, while 12 people had perished from it the previous day.
A total of 19,764 people have died of the disease so far, according to the bulletin. Of the 7 deaths in the state, four persons died in Kolkata, two in North 24 Parganas and one in South 24 Parganas, the bulletin said.
Mayor Hakim told reporters with over 1,000 people reporting Covid positive in the metropolis, the civic body will also make ‘safe homes’ set up during the first coranavirus pandemic wave operational again for people who could not self-isolate themselves as they either lived alone with no caregiver or had too little living space.
He said 80 per cent of the Covid-positive cases were asymptomatic, 17 per cent had mild symptoms, while 3 per cent need hospitalisation according to an analysis of date done by KMC and health experts.
Speaking of the criteria for setting up containment zones, Hakim said in case at least five members of a family of a housing or in a house were infected their flat or house would be declared a micro-containment zone.
The entire structure will be sanitised and those infected by Covid will have to go through another test after five days.
“These days Covid viral load may decline significantly for asymptomatic or mildly symptomatic persons within a week. In case the infected person is reported Covid negative he can resume normal life after a few days rest,” he added.
Infection figures in districts
North 24 Parganas followed in the second position after Kolkata in number of infections with 496 cases on Friday, up from 315 on the previous day, the bulletin said.
Apart from Kolkata and North 24 Parganas, the other districts which recorded high incidence of cases were Howrah (298), South 24 Parganas (126), Hooghly (118), Malda (60) and Nadia (53), according to the data.
With 1,510 people discharged on Friday, the recovery rate stood at 98.14 per cent, it said.
A total of 16,08,011 patients have been discharged so far, it said, adding that the total Covid cases recorded in the state was 16,38,485.
A total of 2,13,91,872 samples have been tested in West Bengal so far, the bulletin said.
