Fourth Covid-19 death in Jharkhand, positive cases tally touches 350

Most of Jharkhand’s fresh coronavirus cases are reported from among migrant workers returning from other states.

Jharkhand on Saturday reported its fourth death due to Covid-19 pandemic after a 39-year-old migrant worker who had recently returned from Mumbai tested positive posthumously. The state also reported 27 new cases in the last 24 hours taking the total count of coronavirus positive cases to 350.

Most fresh positive cases in Jharkhand are detected among migrants returning from other states.(HT Photo Representative use)

The man died at Koderma Sadar hospital two days ago. His samples were taken after death and the report confirming his positive status was received on Saturday.

“The patient was admitted to hospital after he complained of chest pain. At the time of admission, he had no symptoms of coronavirus infection. He died of cardiac complications. Since he was a migrant worker and returned from a Covid-19 hotspot, Mumbai, his samples were taken. On Saturday, his test report appeared positive,” said state health department’s principal secretary Nitin Madan Kulkarni.

He added, “Now, the case will be treated as Covid-19 death.”

Besides this, Koderma district also reported 10 new Covid-19 cases, all migrant workers. The district now has 27 positive cases including one recovery and one death.

Meanwhile, Simdega, East Singhbhum and Ranchi districts, too, reported four, three and two new cases respectively.

On Friday late night, Gumla district detected seven migrant workers to be infected with SARS-COV-2 virus.

Two women from Ranchi’s Angara and Harmu’s Ganganagar locality were also tested positive.

“The 21-year-old woman from Harmu is pregnant. She went to the Rajendra Institute of Medical Sciences (RIMS) a few days back for check up. She had no travel history. We are trying to find out the source of her contagion. We have initiated contact-tracing exercise to identify people who came in direct and indirect contact with her,” said Ranchi civil surgeon Dr VB Prasad.

He added that the second woman was aged about 19 years and had a travel history.

“She had returned from Rajasthan and was observing home quarantine,” Prasad said.

In Simdega, four migrant workers including two women were tested positive for the virus.

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“All the four had returned early this week from Mumbai. They had been staying in quarantine centres in Jaldega, Kolebira and Qurdeg blocks,” said Simdega civil surgeon Dr PK Sinha.

On Friday late night, seven new positive cases were detected in Gumla district. Five of these patients were from Sisai block and two from Basia block.

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“The two from Basia block had returned from Mumbai on May 17. They worked as labourers for the Mumbai metro rail project. Of the five patients from Sisai block, three came from Mumbai and two from Pune,” said Gumla deputy commissioner Sashi Ranjan.