J&K saw 59 new cases of COVID19 on Thursday, taking the total confirmed cases of viral illness to 1449 here. Of these, 684 have already recovered.
Kashmir division had 51 new COVID19 cases today. Of these, Dr S Saleem Khan, nodal officer COVID19 at GMC Srinagar said, 21 were samples taken from District Police Lines (DPL) Kulgam. “Barring one, all of these people are living in DPL Kulgam,” he said. In the past few days, 78 people, mostly police personnel from DPL Anantnag have tested positive.
One young doctor, an intern working with GMC Srinagar also tested positive today. Dr Khan said the intern, a resident of GMC hostel Bemina, was from ENT department and currently posted in the department of psychiatry. In the past, seven doctors from Kashmir division and five from Jammu division have tested positive. Four doctors working in GMC Srinagar tested positive two days ago when they were tested following their exposure to a COVID19 positive patient.
Two pregnant women from Anantnag have also tested positive today. Till date 40 pregnant women have tested positive, as per information provided by directorate of health services Kashmir. These women, DHSK said, are sampled as a focus group to facilitate better access to healthcare at the time of delivery.
Among the districts, Kulgam had the highest share of today’s cases – 21, while Anantnag district saw 12 new cases. Kupwara district also had seven new cases of COVID19. The new cases are from Reshigund village, Kawari and Kupwara town.
Srinagar district also saw five new cases, including the doctor and one elderly patient who passed away late last night, her sample testing positive posthumously. Four samples from Budgam district tested positive today. These samples had not been tested at the two labs in Srinagar. A health department official said, many of the reports were received from a private lab which is testing samples from J&K.
Two samples from Ganderbal – Gundurbal and Safapora were also among today’s cases. No new case was reported from Pulwama, Bandipora, Baramulla and Shopian district today.
In Jammu division, eight new cases were reported today. These include three samples each from Kathua and Ramban districts and one each from Kishtwar and Jammu districts.
The total number of COVID19 cases reached 1449 on Thursday. Of these, J&K government said, 745 are active positive while 684 have recovered. 20 people who have tested positive for COVID19 have lost their life – 18 in Kashmir and two in Jammu division.
As per information bulletin of J&K government, 33856 people are under quarantine currently. Many of these people, a health official said, will be allowed to proceed home when their test reports are available and negative. “Their samples have been taken upon their return from outside,” he said.
While SKIMS Soura reported to have tested 1900 samples in the past 24 hours, over 10,000 samples were pending at the VRDL lab of the Institute. Dr Farooq Jan, medical superintendent SKIMS, said all the paraphernalia of the Institute had been involved in testing samples received in the past few days. “We are trying to finish the backlog as soon as possible,” he said.
At CD Hospital Virology lab, 701 samples were tested in the past 24 hours.