With increasing infections, the positivity rate across the state continues to see an upward trend.
“Karnataka’s positivity rate has come in the range of 20%, the highest since the onset of the pandemic,” said an official privy to the matter on Sunday.
The rate of infection in Bengaluru has witnessed a marginal decline, indicating the possibility of the virus spreading to other districts.The state’s positivity rate has climbed from 0.69% (on January 1) to nearly 20% (as on January 15), according to the state’s Covid-19 war room data.
“Chief minister (CM) Basavaraj Bommai has already spoken to all the heads of district administration and has given them complete freedom to take action, including implementation of additional restrictions based on the ground situation,” Karnataka’s minister for health, family welfare and medical education Dr K Sudhakar said on Sunday.
As per the official data, Bengaluru’s active caseload has come down from around 80% in the last week to around 73% on Saturday.In the last seven days (up to January 15), other districts of Karnataka have added a total of 50,641 new infections as against Bengaluru’s 1,17,488, data shows.
During the same time period, the number of new infections increased from 1,187 on January 1 to 34,047 in the 24-hour period on January 15, according to the daily bulletin of the state health department on Sunday.
{{/usCountry}}During the same time period, the number of new infections increased from 1,187 on January 1 to 34,047 in the 24-hour period on January 15, according to the daily bulletin of the state health department on Sunday.
{{/usCountry}}Due to the night and weekend curfew in Karnataka, people are forced to commute from Bengaluru to their respective villages and towns, adding to the risk of transmitting the virus.
The southern state has lost nearly 40,000 lives to the virus.
Kolar, about 60 km from Bengaluru, has a positivity rate of around 24.6%, closely followed by Tumakuru which stands at 24.26%. A significant amount of people travel to Bengaluru from these two neighbouring districts on a daily basis, thereby increasing the risk of infection.
As per the official information, other districts like Mysuru, Kalaburagi, Mandya, Hassan, Shivamogga, Chitradurga and Ballari have also shown higher positivity rate. At least 15 out of the 30 districts (Vijayanagara is calculated under Ballari) have reported higher than 10% positivity rate, data shows. Only four districts — Haveri, Yadgir, Koppal and Bagalkote — in the state have less than 4% positivity rate.
The Basavaraj Bommai-led Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government has already placed the entire state under restrictions. Previously, the state government had come under fire from its own ministers and party men who expressed concern over loss of livelihoods due to night and weekend curfews.
Meanwhile, the public has also expressed concerns on multiple social media platforms as well for cracking down on people trying to earn a living while giving political leaders a free-pass to violate and later get away without any charges.The possibility of another lockdown has also been doing the rounds on news channels even though the government has denied any such move on its part.
“The government has made all preparations to deal with the third wave of infections,” said the health minister. Sudhakar said that over 10,000 doctors have been trained to deal with Covid patients under home isolation. “In the next few days, all final year medical students will join the effort. No matter how many people get infected, they will be given proper treatment to contain the third wave,” Sudhakar said.