Highest weekly jump in deaths, UP appoints two officers each for three worst-hit districts

The decision was made by the Chief Minister following a review meeting the the Team-11 officials here. (File)

The week ending Sunday witnessed the highest number of Covid deaths in Uttar Pradesh at 36 – a 77 per cent jump from the previous week – taking the death toll in the state to 79.

With 50 per cent of the total deaths being reported from the three red zone districts of Agra, Meerut and Kanpur, Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath on Sunday appointed one senior IAS and one IPS officer for each of the three districts, who will camp there and be in command of the Covid-related works.

These officers will be in addition to nodal officers that were appointed for each of the 75 districts earlier.

“The nodal officers in these districts are supposed to send their reports to the government every morning and evening. The CM has said that the lockdown should be strictly followed in the three districts. In addition, the command for Covid Care has been given to three senior IAS and IPS officers in the three districts, ”a statement issued by the UP government read.

The decision was made by the Chief Minister following a review meeting the the Team-11 officials here.

For Kanpur, the responsibility has been given to UPSIDA MD Anil Garg and IG Deepak Ratan. For Agra, Principal Secretary Alok Kumar and IG Vijay Kumar has been given the command of Covid opeartions, and for Meerut, Principal Secretary T Venkatesh and IG Laxmi Singh will be in charge.

During the May 4-May 10 week, 36 Covid patients died – nearly triple of the preceding week’s death toll that stood at 13.

Agra has so far reported highest deaths at 24, at least 10 in the last one week, followed by Meerut at 13, with at least seven patients dying in the last seven days. Kanpur city has so far reported six deaths.

Notably, these three districts have the highest number of active cases at present – Agra at 406, Kanpur City at 237 and Meerut at 164. There are 1884 active cases in the state.

The remaining 36 deaths have been reported from Moradabad (7), four each in Mathura and Firozabad, three in Aligarh, two each in Jhansi, Ghaziabad and Noida, and one each in Prayagraj, Etah, Mainpuri, Bijnore, Kanpur Dehat, Amroha, Bareilly, Basti, Bulandshahar, Lucknow, Varanasi, and Shravasti.

Earlier, the state health officials had said that almost all the deceased Covid patients are 60 years or above, or a long history of illness and comorbidity. They also said that roughly 25 per cent of them were those who tested positive after their death and the standard Covid treatment was not provided to them.

Meanwhile, the number of total cases reached 3,467 on Sunday with the addition of 94 new infected people.

Among the fresh cases, Meerut report the highest at 22, followed by 13 in Agra, nine in Ghaziabad, eight in Bulandshahr, seven in Kanpur Nagar, five each in Lucknow and Jhansi, three each at Shravasti, Kasganjand Mirzapur, two each in Firozabad , Banda, Mathura and Bahraich, and one each in Farrukhabad, Sonbhadra, Fatehpur, Amethi, Ayodhya, Sultanpur, Etah, Gonda, Unnao, Sambhal, Bijnor, Rae Bareli, Saharanpur, Pratapgarh, Basti and Varanasi.

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