COVID-19: One in 5 active cases in Karnataka reported from Udupi

Karnataka reported 515 fresh coronavrius cases on Friday (June 5), its highest single-day spike since the start of the pandemic, with over 200 being registered in Udipi district, taking the total number of infections in the state to 4,835, the health department said.

The surges comes at a time when the B.S. Yediyurappa-led government is preparing to relax lockdown restrictions starting June 8.

Udupi district which barely had 46 cases and stood 10th among all the 30 districts in the state until a fortnight ago, saw a major spike with over 200 cases on Friday, taking the total tally of the district breaching seven hundred cases mark, to stand at 768.

This implies that there in every five active cases in Karnataka, one belongs to the Udipi district.

Of the 515 fresh cases reported, 482 are returnees from other states, mostly (about 471) from neighboring Maharashtra.

As for Udipi, the district beat Bengaluru Urban and Kalaburagi after the inter-state migration started, with nearly 90 percent of the cases being of patients with travel history to Maharashtra. On Friday alone, of the 204 cases in the district, 203 were Maharashtra returnees.

While the district administration attributed the rise in cases to increased testing in the recent days, Udupi witnessed a compounded daily growth rate of 38 per cent in the past five days in comparison to 3.9 per cent in Bengaluru.

Much on the lines of Kerala, the state strictly followed contact tracing and enforced strict institutional and home quarantine rules, to control the spread overall. Places like Bengaluru and Mysuru which recorded higher cases in the initial days are now under control with 149 and 6 active cases respectively.

Related news: 50% COVID-19 cases in Karnataka have travel history to Maharashtra

But the active cases shot up in Kalaburagi, Yadgir, Raichur, Mandya and Bidar in the past two weeks.

While the state government tested only those inter-state travellers displaying symptoms, from Saturday onwards, Karnataka will test all persons who return from Maharashtra for the COVID-19.

BJP MP from Udupi-Chikmagalur Shobha Karandlaje urged the chief secretary to stop issuing online passes to people travelling from Maharashtra.

“Despite the surge in COVID-19 cases in Udupi, we still received online pass applications from Maharashtra people seeking to travel. The people here are panicking on account of this,” the MP noted.

“While we cannot prevent movement of people coming into the district as per the MHA guidelines and Supreme Court orders, one needs to take into account the shortage of beds and quarantine centres,” she added.

However, the district administration denied shortage of beds and said they are prepared for it in case of spike in cases and have also sought the state to send more medical staff to the district.

Related news: Restriction on inter-state, intra-state movement lifted in Karnataka

“As of now there is no shortage of hospital beds for COVID-19 patients. The state is already making arrangement from private hospitals. They sent nine doctors, 20 nurses, five lab technicians and ten group D workers to cater to the additional demand,” district surgeon Madhusudan Nayak said.

Udupi district administration sought the state to arrange for 2,500 beds in the government-run hospitals to treat COVID-19 patients.

Meanwhile, the state continued the practice of putting notice outside the homes of those under quarantine revealing the patient name. While initially the move was criticised and the government halted the process, now it’s back on the walls irking those who are placed under quarantine.

Karnataka is now taking tech help to track and monitor the progress in the state with the help of the National Association of Software and Services Companies (Nasscom).

The industry body last week delivered a COVID-19 data tracking platform to Karnataka providing real time data across regions. While launching the platform last week Deputy Chief Minister CN Ashwath Narayan said technology innovation has been our greatest ally in these testing times.

“Using innovative technology solutions to fight the pandemic, we are taking a huge step towards showcasing the country’s capacity to solve real time issues in any environment,” he said.