Rajendra Prasad Mohapatra

Bhubaneswar: In view of the surge in the Covid-19 cases in the districts bordering Chhattisgarh, the Odisha government on Thursday asked the concerned district officials to step up health care infrastructure in their respective areas to deal with the emerging situation.

The State’s infection rate reached a new high on Friday when 461 persons tested positive for the virus, the maximum in the past over two months.

The infection has spread across the State pushing the active cases to over 2,500. Districts like Nuapada, Bargarh, Sundargarh and Kalahandi have turned into the epicenters of the resurgence in Covid-19 cases because of the inter-state movement of people to Chhattisgarh.

Meanwhile, the spike in the Twin City is due to the spread of the pandemic in some educational institutions.

In view of the prevailing situation, Additional Chief Secretary (Health) Pradipta Kumar Mohapatra has directed the concerned healthcare authorities to conduct aggressive testing and contact tracing of the infected persons.

“The district authorities have been directed to keep hospital beds ready with the required oxygen supply to meet any eventualities. The SCB Medical College and Hospital authorities have been asked to keep as many as 250 beds ready. The bed strength in Bhubaneswar will also be increased as per the requirement," said Mohapatra.

Of the fresh cases detected on Friday, 272 were reported from quarantine centers while the rest 189 were local transmission cases.

Nuapada reported a maximum of 86 cases followed by Khordha (69), Sundargarh (62), Kalahandi (36), Bargarh (32), Angul (27), Cuttack (22), Sambalpur and Balasore 16 cases each.

Nuapada has so far reported a total of 8,023 Covid-19 cases till date which included 309 actives cases, 27 deaths and 7,687 recoveries.

With the inclusion of Friday’s figure, the total number of coronavirus cases in the State surged to 3,41,772 which included 2,586 active cases. So far 3,37,212 patients have been recovered.

The State has so far tested over 91,03,948 samples including 30,716 on Thursday. Odisha’s positivity rate stands at 3.75 per cent.

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