Six more Covid-19 infections take Himachal tally to 58
Total number of active cases in the hill state is 14,
Six more people tested positive for Covid-19 in Himachal Pradesh on Sunday, taking the total number of cases in the state to 58, officials said.
With three fresh cases, the number of active cases has gone up to 17.
Additional chief secretary (health) RD Dhiman said the new patients are taxi drivers who were ferrying passengers to Himachal from other states.
One of the patients, a 36-year-old man from Gujarat, brought five passengers from Ahmedabad to Baijnath in Kangra district. The other cabbie is 46-year-old from Delhi and had ferried three passengers from Gurugram to Mandi.
They were quarantined at the state border in Bilaspur and their samples were sent to Indira Gandhi Medical College (IGMC), Shimla, for testing and turned out positive.
“All the eight passengers have also been quarantined and their samples are being sent for testing,” said Dhiman.
The third patient, a 19-year-old woman from Kangra, is the sister of the Shahpur (Kangra) man who tested positive for Covid-19 on May 8. Authorities are mapping her contacts now. The three patients have been shifted to hospitals.
Three more people tested positive late in the evening. They are from Chamba and aged 24, 32 and 33. They are primary contacts of a man who returned from Baddi and tested positive on Wednesday.
8 WARDS SEALED IN RURAL HAMIRPUR
Eight wards of three gram panchayats falling under the Nadaun sub-division of the district were all sealed and declared as containment zones on Sunday. The move has come after a person from the area tested positive for Covid-19. As per the order issued by district magistrate Harikesh Meena, the sealed areas are : wards 6 and 7 (Hatli village), wards 2 and 4 (Nukhail village), wards 4 and 5 (Lahra village) — all under gram panchayat Lahra, ward number 1 (Khorar village) of gram panchayat Goes, and ward number 1 (Budhwin village) of gram panchayat Galore Khas. No movement will be allowed in containment zones till further notice.
SPURT IN INFECTIONS IN PAST WEEK
Himachal has witnessed a spurt in infections in the past week, recording 15 cases, including one fatality.
A youngster from Jogindernagar of Mandi district was tested positive for Covid-19 last week.
Following this, a 21-year-old man from Sarkaghat in Mandi, who was suffering from a kidney ailment, died of the contagion at IGMCH, Shimla. His mother also tested positive for the disease.
On Wednesday, two people from Chamba and one from Kangra tested positive for Covid-19.
On Friday, four people, including a two-year-old daughter of a Covid-19 patient from Chamba, tested positive and two cases were reported on Saturday.
So far, the state has reported 55 Covid-19 cases, including two casualties. The first case in the state had been reported on March 20.
Una is the worst-hit district with total 17 cases. Nine cases each have been reported in Solan and Chamba districts. Kangra, the most populous district in the state, also recorded nine cases. Four cases have been reported in Hamirpur, three in Mandi, and two each in Sirmaur and Bilaspur.
