E-Paper
Twin capital cities contribute over 40% of J&K’s Covid-19 infections, deaths
Summer capital Srinagar tops the list with 24,391 cases till date.
The twin capital cities of Jammu and Srinagar have contributed over 40% of the total Covid-19 infections and deaths in the Union territory of Jammu and Kashmir.
Summer capital Srinagar tops the list with 24,391 cases till date. Of the overall 1, 16,600 coronavirus cases in the 20 districts of J&K till December 15, as many as 46,765 persons have been infected in Jammu and Srinagar districts, contributing 40.1% of the total cases.
The government’s health data compiled since the beginning of the pandemic in March till December 15 revealed that there have been 24,391 cases in Srinagar and 22,374 cases in Jammu till date. The rest of the 18 districts in J&K—nine each in the two divisions of Jammu and Kashmir –have registered 69,835 cases.
“The Srinagar and Jammu districts have populations of around 14 and 14.5 lakh respectively while the population of other districts except a few is below 5 lakh each. More people mean more infections,” said Dr Qazi Haroon, officer on special duty with health department to assist government with corona mitigation efforts.
Similarly, Jammu and Srinagar cities have contributed 42.43% of fatalities (769 deaths) of the total 1,812 deaths in the UT. While 436 persons have died in Srinagar, 333 have lost their lives in Jammu.
Haroon said there is more migration to and from the cities. “A lot of people move into and out of the cities every day. There is a lot of intermingling and from every district people come to the cities for purchases,” he said.
Baramulla and Budgam are the only two districts, other than Srinagar and Jammu, to have recorded more than 100 deaths due to Covid-19. Besides Srinagar, the other nine districts in Kashmir have recorded between a minimum of 2,432 cases in south Kashmir’s Shopian to 7,754 cases in north Kashmir’s Baramulla.
Similarly in Jammu division, apart from the capital city, infections in other nine districts have hovered between the lowest 1,570 cases in Reasi to the highest 3,968 in Udhampur.
The overall active cases till December 15 in the UT are 4,434 out of which 1,899 cases are together in Jammu (808) and Srinagar (1,091) comprising 42.82%.
The virus cases are dropping from the past couple of months. In December, there have been 6,376 cases so far while there were 15,434 infections in November as compared to 19,619 cases in October.
Haroon said, “We are far better and are having below 300 cases and a few deaths every day. We have controlled the pandemic to a large extent,” he said.
