Travelling to Karnataka from another state or from abroad? What you need to know

Coronavirus

The stranded passengers will be allowed to come to Karnataka, only according to the availability of quarantine facilities.

Alithea Stephanie Mounika

PTI

Alarmed over a sudden spike in COVID-19 cases after people stranded in other states began entering Karnataka, the state government has decided to permit only Karnataka residents stranded in other states or foreign countries and free from the virus to return, an official said on Sunday. With about 1,200 Karnataka citizens due to return from overseas this week in flights beginning early Monday, only asymptomatic and non-COVID people among them will be allowed to enter into the city for the mandatory 14-day quarantine in hotels, guest houses or hostels. "Only Karnataka residents, stranded in other states or foreign countries due to the extended lockdown will be allowed to return to their home state through the inter-state borders and airports in Bengaluru and Mangaluru from Monday," an official from the State Disaster Management Authority said. They must inform their place of arrival and date while registering to return to Karnataka. The stranded passengers will be allowed to come to Karnataka according to the availability of quarantine facilities and everyone must register in the Seva Sindhu portal. "Only those who are ready to undergo quarantine must register their names and they must be tested for COVID-19 even if they were tested in other states," Chief Minister BS Yediyurappa told officials at a high level meeting he held with them. Karnataka has prepared a set of rules for anyone travelling within districts, from other states and from abroad. Inter-district travellers Travellers who commute between different districts of Karnataka and have exhibit symptoms like cold, cough , fever etc will be tested immediately upon arrival. If positive, they will be admitted to the dedicated covid hospital in the area. However, if they are negative they can do 14 days of home quarantine or can be referred to other non-covid hospitals based on symptoms. However, people travelling from other districts of the state and have no symptoms do not have to undergo any testing or quarantine. Inter-state travellers Those who have travelled from other states and show symptoms will be tested immediately upon arrival. While whoever tests positive is admitted to covid-19 hospitals, symptomatic travellers who test negative for the virus will still undergo 14 days of institutional quarantine and be tested again at the end of this period. Inter-state travellers without symptoms have been divided into two groups. The first group consists of travellers who have come to urban areas. Among this, those who have come from high risk states or red zones will have to undergo 14 days of compulsory institutional quarantine. This means they will be sent to quarantines run by the state or hotels where paid quarantine has been set up. Those who have come from low risk states can observe 14-day home quarantine, they will be stamped at arrival. The other group includes everyone who has travelled to rural areas. All such people have to mandatorily undergo two weeks of institutional quarantine. Both these groups have to be tested at the end of this period. The only exception the government makes is for travellers from Goa to rural areas in Karnataka, they only need to undergo 14 days of home quarantine. International travel Finally, all international passengers landing in Karnataka will get tested immediately upon arrival, whether they exhibit symptoms or not. While people who test positive will be shifted to dedicated hospitals, those who test negative - regardless of symptoms - will still undergo 14 days of institutional quarantine in the state. They will then be tested again at the end of this period. Karnataka’s COVID-19 positive cases are currently at 858, with a high of 53 cases on Sunday — the highest number of cases reported in a single day in the state since the first case was reported two months ago, on March 9. The new cases were reported in Belagavi, Shivamogga, Bagalkote, Uttara Kannada, Kalaburagi, Bengaluru Urban, Chikkaballapura and Davangere.  

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Over 300 Indians evacuated from London land in Bengaluru on board Air India flight

Coronavirus

The flight landed in the wee hours of the morning, officials said.

TNM Staff

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Air India's first evacuation flight to Karnataka from London landed in Bengaluru, with 326 passengers who are citizens of Karnataka," an official said in the early hours of Monday morning. "The A-I 1803 Boeing-777-337 (ER) from London landed at the Kempegowda international airport at 4.41 a.m., with 326 passengers, including 3 infants," a state government official told IANS. The flight was over 101 minutes behind schedule, as it flew via New Delhi where it took off at 2.23 a.m. All passengers were seen wearing mask and maintaining physical distance while coming out of the aircraft through the aero-bridge and till exiting the airport after thermal screening, testing and filling the self-declaration form about their travel history, health status and other details for contact tracing. All international passengers will be held in mandatory quarantine for 14 days. Nearly a hour after landing, the passengers were ferried in special buses to hotels for the mandatory 14-day quarantine amid the lockdown enforced on March 25 and extended twice up to May 17 to contain the coronavirus spread in the country. Deccan Herald reported that BMTC buses, which were arranged for the passengers, took the passengers to the quarantine centres. Also, the pathways, which were barricaded for the passengers, were repeatedly disinfected, the report stated. State Medical Education Minister K. Sudhakar, a doctor by profession, was at the airport in the wee hours to receive the returnees and guide them in completing the formalities. Also present were a large number of healthcare workers, policemen, and staff. As part of the Indian government's evacuation programme “Vande Bharat Mission”, three more Air India repatriation flights are due to land in Bengaluru from Jeddah in Saudi Arabia, San Francisco in the US and Singapore on May 13-15 with over 600 of the state’s residents. Two Air India Express flights are slated to land at Mangaluru airport on May 13-14, with about 350-400 returnees from the Gulf region. With inputs from IANS

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Karnataka hits ‘landmark’ 1 lakh COVID-19 tests: How it fares against other states

Coronavirus

Karnataka has a better testing/ million population than the national average.

Soumya Chatterjee

PTI, Representative image

Karnataka Medical Education Minister K Sudhakar on Saturday had announced that the state has surpassed the ‘landmark’ of 1 lakh tests for COVID-19 since March 8 when the first case was detected in the state. A total of 1,07,311 samples have been tested so far, out of which 5,068 were tested on Saturday alone, the state health department said in its bulletin on Sunday evening. With the “landmark” of 1 lakh tests reached, here’s a look at how other Indian states are faring. Among neighbouring states, only Kerala (36,648) has reported a lesser number of tests so far while the number of tests done in Telangana is not known as the numbers have not been made public. While Tamil Nadu has tested 2,29,670 samples, Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra have done 1,65,069 and 2,27,804 tests respectively. However, experts have noted that the test numbers should ideally be compared in terms of tests done with respect to how large the population of the state or country is. Speaking on this, Dr CN Manjunth, state nodal officer for testing, said, “Random testing has to be done both in containment zones and also green zones. If we can do a substantial number of random tests in green zones and if they come back negative, then we can open up those areas fully. Otherwise, if there are random tests in which results come back as positive, it might suggest that community transmission has taken place. So there is no alternative to testing a significant part of the population. Considering all this, we are not doing bad and we will significantly improve by month-end.” Tests/ million Among large Indian states with populations of over 1 crore, Karnataka stands eighth in the count of tests done per million of population. While Delhi is the best with 5027 persons tested per million, Karnataka has tested 1687 persons per million. Andhra Pradesh (3330/million), Jammu and Kashmir (2495/million), Tamil Nadu (2423/million), Rajasthan (1967/million), Maharashtra (1870/million) and Gujarat (1816/million) are the other states with better testing ratio. India as a whole now has a testing rate of 1263 per million. Upscaling daily tests A target of daily 10,000 tests was set earlier with Pankaj Kumar Pandey, the Commissioner of Health and Family Welfare Department saying the state was on course to do the same by May-end. So far, the highest number of daily tests was done on May 3 with 5168 samples tested and since then, the highest daily test count was achieved on Sunday, May 10. Reiterating the state government’s stand, Dr V Ravi, a virologist with Bengaluru-based National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences (Nimhans) said gradually the tests will pick up from the end of the month. “There is no shortage of test kits and the government is in the process of acquiring more test kits so that we can reach the 10,000 mark on a daily basis. Also, in terms of labs, we have a high number so there is no shortage of capacity. Along with the private labs, we have a total of 62 testing centres,” he said.

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Bus carrying students from Bengaluru to Kerala collides with tanker in TN, 25 injured

Accident

Other than the driver, all those injured were students hailing from Kottayam in Kerala and all of them had received passes to cross the Kerala border on Sunday.

TNM Staff

A private passenger bus transporting students stranded in Bengaluru to Kerala met with an accident on Sunday after it collided with a water tanker. The accident took place on Karur-Salem National Highway near Ram Nagar area in Karur, Tamil Nadu, while the bus was on its way to Kottayam in Kerala. There were 24 nursing and IT students on board the bus and all of them, including the driver, were injured in the accident. The bus collided with a water tanker that was coming from the opposite direction. Visuals of the incident show that the bus was completely damaged from the front as it collided head-on into the tanker appearing to make a turn.  All 25 injured were taken to a private hospital nearby by people present in the vicinity of the accident spot. All of the injured people received treatment at the hospital and while 24 were discharged later in the evening, one patient, believed to be the driver, was referred to another hospital for further treatment. A bus was later arranged by authorities to escort the 24 students back to Kerala. Other than the driver, all those injured were students hailing from Kottayam in Kerala and all of them had received passes to cross the Kerala border on Sunday. They had been stuck in Bengaluru since interstate travel was prohibited in the first two phases of the lockdown. The country is under lockdown till May 17, but interstate travel is allowed for those who have entry passes.  Entry passes are mandatory to enter Kerala through check posts bordering the neighbouring states and the Kerala Chief Minister has said that till now, 54,262 passes have been issued and so far, 21,812 Keralites from other states have reached back home through five border check posts. Meanwhile, seven people, including three who had arrived from Abu Dhabi on May 7 in the repatriation flight from the Gulf, tested positive for coronavirus on Sunday, taking the total number of people under treatment for the virus in Kerala to 20. With this, five foreign returnees who reached the state from the Gulf as part of the Centre's 'Vande Bharat Mission' to bring back stranded Indians and expatriates in other countries, especially the GCC, due to the COVID-19 lockdown, have tested positive. Days after the state had declared that it had flattened the curve, new cases were being reported. Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, had on Saturday said the new cases were a "warning to those coming back from abroad and for other states to be on the alert." (With PTI inputs)

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Key virus model notes states where jumps in population movement may spread disease

The model now projects 137,184 U.S. deaths through early August.

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Pritzker: Illinois is 'going it alone' on tackling coronavirus

The state is currently in "phase two" of Pritzker's five-part reopening plan.

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‘Highly detrimental to environment’: Activists slam Karnataka’s new sand mining policy

Environment

Activists pointed out this move can cause flash floods in times of heavy downpour.

Soumya Chatterjee

The Karnataka government’s decision to pass an ordinance to allow sand mining in the freshwater beds of the state during the lockdown has shocked environmentalists in the state. Until now, sand mining was only allowed in river basins and delta regions of the state. With the ordinance passed on April 30, sand can be mined from tanks, ponds and patta land in gram panchayat areas. The government will identify and auction these sand beds, and aims to raise a sum of Rs 70 crore through it. While the state government has reasoned that the move will allow for cheap sand for construction purposes for the people in the state, environmental activists have said this will have dangerous results that will impact people's lives which outweigh the Rs 70 crore revenue that will be added to the government’s kitty. Flash floods, shortage of drinking water and the death of aquatic animals are some of the immediate impacts environmentalists warned of. Criticising the move by the government, former IFS (Indian Forest Service) officer and noted environmentalist AN Yellappa Reddy said, “This move is highly detrimental to the environment. We have to realize that the sandbed provides an excellent living media for aquatic plants and animals. Most aquatic animals — frogs, crabs, fish — won’t survive otherwise. This will completely kill the biodiversity of these water bodies and without these plants and animals, the water won’t remain clean. They are also important for keeping the dissolved oxygen levels and also without the organic material that is released into the water won’t be converted into biomass.” He added that another important aspect was that during heavy rains or when there is a high inflow of water, the speed of runoff is reduced due to the sand. “The sandbed can also trap the organic matter and allow water to infiltrate the earth and recharge groundwater. If we scrape off every grain of sand, then the lake beds will be sterile. When there is heavy rainfall, this can cause flash floods,” he added.  Karnataka has been already facing successive years of drougts and the disaster management department has to arrange drinking water through tankers in many villages. Activist Sandeep Anirundhan said that activists across the state will run social media campaigns against the move and some groups are also thinking about approaching the court to stop environmental destruction. He pointed out similar decisions in the Cauvery delta region in Tamil Nadu have left the region water scarce. He said, “It will finish off the freshwater ecosystem. Freshwater fishes have already reduced by more than 80% due to pollution and overfishing.”   

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