Contacts of 64% COVID-19 patients yet to be traced in Bengaluru

Coronavirus

BBMP officials say that the reason for delay in contact tracing is due to the sudden spike in cases in the city.

TNM Staff

PTI/Representation Photo

Over the last three days, Bengaluru has witnessed a sudden spike in the number of COVID-19 patients. On Wednesday Bengaluru had 735 people who tested positive for the coronavirus. With the increasing number of cases, the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike is now struggling to trace the contacts in close to 64% of the total number of positive cases.  As of July 1, there were 4,652 patients with COVID-19 in Bengaluru and of these, contacts of 2,963 patients are still being traced. BBMP officials say that the reason for the delay is due to the sudden spike in the number of people testing positive in the last four days.  On July 1, there were 735 new patients with COVID-19, there were 738 new patients on June 30, 783 new patients on June 29 and 596 new patients on June 28.  “There has been a sudden spike in cases. Earlier we used to have fewer cases. The spike is also because of Unlock 1.0. With so many people testing positive in less than a week, we are working hard to trace the contacts,” BBMP Commissioner BH Anil Kumar said.  According to data provided by the BBMP, there were 176 patients with COVID-19 lodged in isolation in Bengaluru as of May 31, the last day of the lockdown. After Unlock 1.0 was implemented on June 1, the number of cases rose by 96% in the city. In just one month, the number of patients in isolation rose to 4,476.  The positivity rate rose from 1.17% to 4.74%. “The largest spike happened between June 22 and June 30, where we had 2,977 active cases. With these sheer numbers, it is obviously going to take time to trace contacts, map containment zones among other things,” Anil Kumar added.  The ward with the highest number of cases is Padarayanapura with 80 people getting COVID-19. VV Puram has 73 patients, Dharmaraya Swamy Nagar has 53 patients, Shivajinagar has 52, Hogasandra has 51, KR Market and SK garden have 36 and 35 patients respectively. The areas with more than 15 patients with COVID-19 include Sampangi Rama Nagar, Chamarajpet, Chalavadipalya, Shantala Nagar, Chickpet, Siddapura, Singasandra, Mangammanapalya, Jnana Bharati Nagar, Hoodi, Gottigere, Kengeri and Kumaraswamy Layout. As of Wednesday evening, there were 485 containment zones in the city.  “Most of the containment zones are located in West, South-Central and South-West Bengaluru. 87% of the containment zones are individual houses, so we have had to cordon off 100 m areas from the patients’ houses. Around 10% of the containment zones are apartments. We have 14 clusters of containment zones in Bengaluru, two slum areas that are containment zones and one hotel,” Anil Kumar added.  

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DK Shivakumar to take charge as Karnataka Congress president on Thursday

Politics

The event will be live-streamed to party offices across Karnataka.

IANS

File photo

Congress troubleshooter D.K. Shivakumar would take over as the party's Karnataka President on Thursday and the event would be streamed live for party leaders and cadres across the state, a party leader said. "Shivakumar's Pratigna Dina (Oath-taking day) as the Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) president will be held at the party office from 10.30 a.m. onwards in compliance with the lockdown guidelines, which restricts the gathering to about 50 people," party leader M.A. Saleem told IANS in Bengaluru. Congress General Secretary K.C. Venugopal, newly-elected Rajya Sabha member from state Mallikarjun Kharge, Congress Legislature Party leader Siddaramaiah, former state chief Dinesh Gundu Rao, former Union Minister Rehman Khan and party's women's wing head Pushpa Amarnath will be present at the event. The event will begin with homage to 20 martyrs of the Indian Army who died in a clash with Chinese soldiers in Ladakh's Galwan Valley on June 15. It will be followed by 'Vande Mataram', welcome speech by state Working President Saleem Ahmed and party's flag exchange from Gundu Rao to Shivakumar. Venugopal will deliver the inaugural speech, followed by Gundu Rao, Shivakumar, Kharge, Siddaramaiah, party's leader in Legislative Council S.R. Patil and Working Presidents Eshwar Khandre and Satish Jarkiholi. "Khan will administer oath to all party members on the Preamble of the Constitution and Shivakumar will take the party's pledge," said Saleem. Touting it to be an historic event, Shivakumar said though he would assume charge in the presence of a few party leaders due to restriction on a large gathering, hundreds of party leaders and cadres would join the programme in virtual world at 7,800 places across the state through live streaming. "Hundreds of our party members and supporters will watch the historic event from their homes, panchayats, civic offices and civic wards across the state, wearing masks and maintaining social distance," he said. Though Shivakumar, 58, was appointed on March 11, he could not take charge since then, due to the lockdown. Shivakumar's appointment came three months after Gundu Rao resigned on December 9 following the party's debacle in the Assembly by-elections on December 5, in which only 2 out of the 15 candidates won, while the ruling BJP got 12. Shivakumar is a legislator from the Kanakapura assembly segment. His brother D.K. Suresh is the party's Lok Sabha member from the Bangalure Rural constituency for the second time. He was the party's only candidate to have retained the seat, while 20 others lost in the May 2019 general elections.

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Karnataka contract doctors say they’ll discontinue services if not regularised by July 8

Health

Chief Minister BS Yediyurappa had earlier assured the contract doctors that their jobs would be regularised, but doctors allege that no action has been taken since.

Alithea Stephanie Mounika

PTI/New Delhi. Representative image

On the occasion of National Doctors’ day, hundreds of contract doctors wrote to the state government that they will not be offering their services beyond July 8, as their jobs have not been regularised despite assurances. This is projected to affect lakhs of people who avail government health services in rural areas, the statement signed by the doctors on Wednesday said. Currently there are 507 doctors who are working on contract basis in Karnataka. Last month, the doctors had threatened to resign en masse if their jobs were not regularised. Though there are about 30% medical doctors’ posts vacant in the state, the government has hesitated to regularise the contract doctors as there is a huge pay disparity between the two posts, for doing the same work. On June 17, the state government had asked them to withdraw their resignations, which they had given in protest, and assured the they would be regularised. However, the doctors allege that no action has materialised in this regard. In a two-page statement, the contract doctors wrote that they are “working to the best of their abilities putting their life on the line to fight against COVID-19. These doctors have been doing the same work and maintaining all the responsibilities which a regular doctor does, since many years, for half the salary. Even with a huge pandemic like COVID-19 running rampant, these (contract) doctors are working day and night without any job security.” “[We have been] put into such a situation that we have become helpless and with a grieving heart we have taken this decision,” the statement adds. The letter noted that most of the contract doctors were from rural Karnataka. The statement also noted that the government was initially regularising contract doctors after they finish three years of service, but that is no longer happening. “Government was regularising contract doctors from 2007-2017 and it has been halted since then. We made a request to regularise us in our own respective working places as the government was doing earlier. We have been submitting multiple requests to the authorities since 3 years,” the statement said. It also noted that they were being pressured to quit by their families, as there was no job security, and they were providing their services at a risky time. “As of now plenty of doctors and health care professionals have succumbed to COVID-19. We are pressurized by our scared family members to resign as there is no job or life security for the work we are doing. Even we are ready to put our life on the line and do the duty. That is the reason we requested for regularisation of our services. But we are sad and de-motivated as the government hasn't taken any action. Superficially it appears as if the government doesn't need us. Based on that we are requesting the government to relieve us from work immediately.” The statement is signed off under the name of “Disheartened Contract Doctors.”

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America’s told-you-so moment: How we botched the reopening

The resurgence of Covid-19 was preventable, but the country’s rush to end shutdowns triggered disaster.

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Testing czar says coronavirus surge is straining testing capacity

“It is absolutely correct that some labs across the country are reaching or near capacity,” Giroir said Wednesday.

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735 new COVID-19 patients reported in Bengaluru, more than 1,000 in Karnataka

Coronavirus

Of the new cases reported in Karnataka, 822 have no known contact history yet.

Alithea Stephanie Mounika

PTI/Mumbai

Karnataka reported 1,272 new coronavirus patients on Wednesday, taking the total number of active cases in the state to 8,194. Karnataka has reported 16,514 cases of coronavirus till date. 822 of the new cases reported have no known contact history at the time of reporting the bulletin, and contact tracing for them is underway. 145 people were discharged after they recovered from COVID-19, taking the number of recoveries in the state to 8,063. Bengaluru reported 735 new cases of coronavirus on Wednesday. This takes the total active cases in the Karnataka capital to 5,290. The city administration is currently trying to arrange more beds as the number of coronavirus patients being reported has been increasing. Even then, many reports of critically ill patients, suspected of having COVID-19 but being turned away from hospitals, have been reported in the city. Read: Turned away by 18 hospitals in Bengaluru, 52-year-old man with breathlessness dies Other than Bengaluru no other district reported more than 100 cases. Ballari (85), Dakshina Kannada (84), Dharwad (35) are the other districts which reported more than 30 cases on Wednesday. Bengaluru Rural reported 29 COVID-19 patients. Vijayapara and Hassan reported 28 cases each while Uttara Kannada reported 23 cases. Udupi (22), Chamrajanagara (21) and Bagalkote (20) are the other districts which reported more than 20 cases. All other districts reported 20 or less than 20 cases for the day. A total of 292 patients in the state are being treated in intensive care units (ICU), including 191 from Bengaluru. Dharwad is treating 16 patients in ICUs, and Kalaburagi, 13. Other districts reported less than 10 patients in ICUs, except Ballari which has 11 patients in the ICU. Karnataka has also reported seven COVID-19 deaths on Wednesday. All but one person from Bengaluru were reported to be male patients. Two deaths have been reported from Bengaluru; both of the deceased were 50 years old. Bidar has also reported two people’s deaths in the district, both of whom had returned from Telangana. Meanwhile, Hassan, Dakshina Kannada and Belagavi reported one death each in the district. All patients whose deaths were reported on Wednesday passed away either on June 30 or July 1. Read: Karnataka mulls home isolation for asymptomatic COVID-19 patients

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COVID-19 victims to be buried in designated land on Bengaluru outskirts

Coronavirus

Two acres of land will be identified for this purpose on the outskirts, Karnataka Health Minister B Sriramulu said on Wednesday.

PTI

Bodies of COVID-19 victims will not be laid to rest in burial grounds in Bengaluru city and a separate place will be earmarked on the outskirts in the backdrop of safety concerns raised by the public, Karnataka Health Minister B Sriramulu said on Wednesday. Two acres of land will be identified for this purpose on the outskirts, he said and warned against unscientific disposal of used Personal Protection Equipment kits worn by the kin of the dead for the final rites, referring to reports about such instances. "A news report form Bengaluru said that after last rites, the kits have been thrown there itself and due to wind it has come near houses nearby, creating panic among the residents," he said. In some places, people have also expressed concern over bodies of those who died of the coronavirus being buried in their neighbourhood. Speaking to reporters in Chikkaballapura town, Sriramulu said, taking note of it, he had spoken to the Assistant Chief Secretary about issuing a government order to ensure COVID-19 positive dead were not laid to rest at burial grounds in the city. Two acres of land will be identified on the outskirts of the city for such burials. "I will issue an order in this regard," he said. Later in a tweet, the Minister warned against discarding PPE kits anywhere after use and said they should be disposed of by following the procedure. "Strict action will be taken against such people. Because of someone's neglect, common people's lives should not be at risk. Concerned officials will be held responsible," he said. This development incidentally comes after a viral video had emerged from Ballari, the minister’s home district citing mass burial and officials throwing off the mortal remains  of the deceased  COVID-19 patients into the burial pits with disregard. The incident has led to the Deputy Commissioner to launch a probe led by the Additional DC.

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