Six residential segments share 46% of Covid-19 cases in Ghaziabad

Six residential segments in Ghaziabad, including prime localities of Indirapuram, Vaishali, Vasundhara and Raj Nagar, accounted for about 46% of total Covid-19 cases

Six residential segments in Ghaziabad, including prime localities of Indirapuram, Vaishali, Vasundhara and Raj Nagar, accounted for about 46% of total Covid-19 cases in the district since the outbreak began in March. Residents associations claim they are not involved in the district administration’s strategy, while officials of the district health department say that they are increasing focus in these areas.

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According to official records, residential segment Karhera-2 (comprising Indirapuram) accounted fro 1541 cases, Carte (Kavi Nagar, Avantika, Nehru Nagar, Shastri Nagar, Chiranjeev Vihar etc) 1398, Sahibabad-2 (Raj Bagh, Shalimar Garden, Rajendra Nagar, Lajpat Nagar etc) 1151, Raj Nagar 1116, Vaishali 796 and Vasundhara 754 during this period. The district then had 14,513 cases.

The figures also indicated a high concentration of cases in urban segments, with the rural segments (of Dasna, Loni, Murdnagar, Modinagar and Bhojpur) having an overall share of only 14.9% of the total cases during the period.

Doctors said the rising trend of Covid-19 cases in several residential pockets was probably due to large working population and high population density.

“Residents too are to blame. They are complacent in wearing masks and adhering to health protocols. We get so many patients who visit us without wearing masks and we have to tell them each time to stick to protocol as the risk of Sars-Cov-2 has not subsided,” said Dr. Ashish Agarwal, president of Indian Medical Association – Ghaziabad. “The trend may increase in winter as cases of flu generally increase then.”

Residents welfare associations (RWAs) said that ever since the markets, daily bazars and weekly markets have opened up, social distancing has gone for a toss.

“In areas like Indirapuram, there is hardly any enforcement. Containment zones are hardly contained. RWAs and apartment owners association (AOA) are not included in the district’s strategy either,” said Alok Kumar, founder member of federation of association of apartment owners.

Agreeing that residents were not being involved in the fight, Col (retd) T P Tyagi, presidnet of flat owners’ federation said, “We had already conveyed our issues in this regard to the local administration during our meetings held in past.”

The district administration, however, said that they had included RWAs in their strategy.

“We have increased surveillance, testing and monitoring of the high incidence areas in order to control new cases and spread of infection. Apart from this, we have requested the RWAs to help in awareness drives. Besides, we have also launched massive public awareness campaign through the vehicles of police and corporation,” said Ajay Shankar Pandey, district magistrate.

The district health department said that they are aiming to test all in containment zones.

“Our focus is on 100% testing in containment zones as several of the residential segments like Indirapuram, Vishali, Vasundhara, Kavi Nagar and Raj Nagar among others have most of the containment zones from where we are getting new cases. So, we are working of focussed strategy to contain cases in these areas with more testing and increased surveillance,” said an officer from the health department who wished not to be named.