Single day highest 40 cases in Udhampur
*5 new positives in Ladakh
Sanjeev Pargal
Sanjeev Pargal
JAMMU, June 26: In fresh spike in COVID-19 cases, 63 persons today tested positive in Jammu region, 40 in Udhampur district only, including 11 pregnant women, 13 security personnel-seven from ITBP, three police and three from other security forces-while 35 Corona patients were treated and discharged from the hospitals
Five new COVID cases were reported in the Union Territory of Ladakh including three in Leh and two in Kargil districts.
Udhampur district today recorded single day highest of 40 Coronavirus positive cases including 10 pregnant women who had been tested for the virus ahead of their delivery, three troops and two police constables on guard duty. This is for the first time that 40 COVID positive cases have been reported in a single day in any district of Jammu region since the pandmic broke out. Prior to this, Ramban district had reported 39 cases in a day.
Deputy Commissioner Udhampur Dr Piyush Singla told the Excelsior that out of 40 positives, 24 were travelers including nine civilian contacts of positive cases, 10 pregnant women, two police constables who were on guard duty, three troopers and one food handler.
Sudden spike in COVID positive cases in Udhampur district is attributed to aggressive sampling including random at different places especially high and low risk contacts of positive persons, shopkeepers, their staff, patients and others.
Of 10 pregnant women testing positive today, all had been sampled during checking in the hospitals ahead of their deliveries. They have been isolated from their families and their contacts will also be sampled in next couple of days.
Dr Singla said all positive persons have been shifted to different COVID hospitals. Majority of them were already under administrative quarantine.
Some of the areas could be declared as Red Zones in view of positive cases especially that of pregnant women and food handler. Shakti Nagar area of Udhampur was tonight declared as Red Zone.
Out of 40 positive cases in Udhampur district, 35 were tested in the Command Hospital Udhampur, Lt Col Inam Danish Khan, Classified Specialist (Microbiology), said.
Two persons tonight tested Corona positive in Jammu district. They include a 47- year- old from Bus Stand Jammu and 30-year-old male from Nagrota. Both were under quarantine.
A 38-year-old man from Himachal Pradesh who had reached Jammu from Srinagar and was sampled today tested positive for the virus.
Eight persons including six ITBP personnel, an Indian Reserve Police (IRP) jawan of 2nd battalion and an Uttar Pradesh resident who works at a cloth shop have reported COVID positive in Rajouri district, SSP Rajouri Chandan Kohli said.
All six positive ITBP personnel belonged to 28th battalion Rajouri and had travel history of Haryana. In fact, all of them were inhabitants of Haryana and had returned to duty after leave when they were sampled and tested positive. They were under quarantine at the ITBP formation.
The IRP jawan who tested positive in Rajouri was posted in 2nd IRP battalion at the district and had returned to duty from his hometown of Kupwara after availing leave.
Ramban, Kishtwar and Doda districts didn’t report any positive cases today.
Three persons including an Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) jawan and an ex-serviceman have reported positive for the virus in Poonch district.
The ex-serviceman hailed from Dara Dulliyan with travel history of Mumbai while the ITBP jawan belonged to village Salani in Poonch and had come to home on leave. Third positive case is a 34-year-old male from Poonch.
SSP Poonch Ramesh Angral said all positive persons have been shifted to COVID Hospitals.
Kathua district reported five new COVID cases today.
All of them were travelers from Kathua who had returned from New Delhi and Mumbai and were under administrative quarantine. They have been shifted from the quarantine centres to the COVID hospitals.
Meanwhile, 1607 more persons have crossed Lakhanpur, the gateway to Jammu and Kashmir, from different parts of the country during last 24 hours, District Magistrate OP Bhagat said, adding that there was no let up in influx of persons at the gateway with on an average 1000 persons daily entering the Union Territory.
Three persons including an Assistant Sub Inspector (ASI) of Jammu and Kashmir Armed Police and a pregnant woman have tested positive for COVID-19 in Reasi district.
The 57-year-old ASI of Armed Police hailed from Kamad Anantnag and had returned to duty in Reasi district when he tested positive for the virus. However, he was already under administrative quarantine. A 25-year-old pregnant woman from Painthal and an 18-year-old youth from Balmatkote with travel history of Shopian have also tested positive in Reasi district.
With today’s 63 positives, Jammu region now has 1496 COVID cases but, out of them, only 493 are active. There have been 992 recoveries and seven deaths in the region.
A total of 35 patients were today treated and discharged from various COVID hospitals in the region including nine in Kathua district, eight each in Jammu and Udhampur districts, four in Samba, three Ramban, two Poonch and one Reasi.
Of them, 10 persons were discharged from the Chest Diseases Hospital, Bakshi Nagar, Medical Superintendent Dr Rajeshwar Sharma said.
Meanwhile, five persons were tested positive in the Union Territory of Ladakh including three in Leh and two in Kargil district taking total number of cases in the region to 946, 254 in Leh and 692 in Kargil. Of them, only 478 are active cases—116 in Leh and 362 in Kargil.
As many as 467 Corona patients have been treated and discharged in Ladakh while there has been one Corona casualty.
Of positive cases, 32 have been admitted in COVID hospitals, 432 are in home isolation and 14 in COVID Care Centres.
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