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New Delhi: A 31-year-old Delhi police officer was among 126 people who died from the coronavirus in the past 24 hours, as 2,958 new cases were detected on Wednesday, bringing the total to 49,391. The new cases include 85 from the Border Security Force.
To meet domestic demand with increasing infections, the government has banned the export of alcohol-based hand sanitizers.
As of now, 33,514 people are in treatment, while 14,183 have been discharged. In the last 24 hours, 1,456 people were discharged, bringing the total recovery rate to 28.72 percent. PTI, however, said there were a total of 49,785 cases, 14,046 were discharged and 1,632 people died.
In Delhi, 70 policemen have been infected. The young officer who died was asymptomatic and had no symptoms until Monday night. At dusk he had a high fever and shortness of breath. He was first taken to a private hospital, then to a government hospital where he was pronounced dead. This has alarmed many in the health fraternity and the police.
The BSF detected 85 new cases on Wednesday, bringing the total number of cases in its ranks to 152. Most of them (110) are from Delhi and the rest from Tripura. The CRPF has 137 positive cases, although none were detected on Wednesday.
The Delhi government ordered the release of 4,000 members of Tablighi Jamaat on Wednesday after they completed the quarantine period: 900 of them are from Delhi and the rest from Tamil Nadu and Telangana.
Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan, in a meeting with state health ministers, expressed concern about high death rates in parts of Maharashtra and Gujarat, where in many cases patients had suppressed information or reported late to hospitals for fear of being stigmatized.
Meanwhile, the Center noted that West Bengal had very low levels of evidence and a high death rate of 13.2 percent. The Interior Ministry said it was the highest for any state, noting the high cases of lockdown violations in Kolkata and Howrah in specific locations, where “crown warriors” had faced attacks.
In a letter to the chief secretary of West Bengal, Rajiva Sinha, the Union’s secretary of the interior, Ajay Bhalla, called for a stricter enforcement of the blockade, calling attention to overcrowding in the markets, the free movement of people in large numbers without masks, people playing cricket and soccer, practicing rickshaws and laxity in applying the rules of social distancing in the containment areas.
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