'Community Transmission Behind Covid Spike In Twin City'

Bhubaneswar: With the daily Covid-19 infections going through the roof in twin cities of Cuttack and Bhubaneswar, State Director of Health Services Bijay Mohapatra on Wednesday said community transmission is one of the reasons behind the spike.

Speaking to media, Mohapatra said the number of cases in Bhubaneswar and Cuttack is increasing as many people are coming to the city from different places. One positive person is infecting multiple persons. Hence the cases are increasing.

Mohapatra said the daily infections is also increasing rapidly in western Odisha. He assured that there is no shortage of beds in hospitals even as the State reported over 8,000 daily infections today, highest since the outbreak of pandemic.

Mohapatra said, “There is no shortage of beds at the hospitals so far. While the occupancy of ICU beds is around 53%, for ventilators and general beds it is around 33% to35 % and 36% respectively.”

“The infections are increasing in western Odisha. But there are no problems. We are monitoring the situation daily and accordingly increasing the number of beds when and wherever it is required,” he informed.

Meanwhile, former AIIMS Director Ashok Mohapatra has advised to come up with new strategies to curb exploding cases of Covid-19 infection in Cuttack and Bhubaneswar.

“Gathering in vegetable, fish markets and liquor shops are the main reason behind exponential rise in cases,” he said adding that, New strategies are need of the hour,” Mohapatra said.

Notably, Odisha reported 8386 new infections in the last 24 hours pushing the cumulative caseload tally to 42,8515 in the State.

The cases exploded in Khordha as district reported 1840 cases in last one day, while Cuttack reported 496 cases.