Containing the virus: Check out India's COVID-19 hotspots here

According to Health Ministry guidelines, hotspots can be identified by the number of cases in an area or the rate at which cases double in that area.
Police personnel stand guard at Gali No. 6, Sangam Vihar, an area which has been identified as a containment zone on Sunday. (Photo | EPS/Parveen Negi)
Police personnel stand guard at Gali No. 6, Sangam Vihar, an area which has been identified as a containment zone on Sunday. (Photo | EPS/Parveen Negi)

Amongst the advisories following the lockdown extension till May 3, the Health Ministry on Tuesday announced that 170 COVID-19 hotspots have been identified in the country on the basis of number of cases and the rate at which they double in that area. 

Preeti Sudan, the health secretary said in a letter that these hotspots have to be updated every week on Monday or earlier.

Based on the number of case reported from each state, the districts have been classified into:

  • Hotspots,
  • Non-hotspots districts reporting cases
  • Districts which have not reported positive cases

Hotspots (Red Zones) are areas with the highest case load districts contributing to more than 80 per cent of cases in lndia, or highest case load districts contributing to more than 80 per cent of cases for each state in lndia or districts with doubling rate of less than 4 days (calculated every Monday for last 7 days, to be determined by the state government).

If no cases are reported from hotspots (designated red zones) in the next 14 days after effective containment activities, they will be designated orange zones and if no case is reported for 28 days, they will become designated green zones.

Photo | Ministry of Health
Photo | Ministry of Health

The 170 hotspots over 20 states have been divided into two lists: One with the large outbreaks (123) and the other are hotspots districts with clusters (47).

Here is a state-wise break up of hotspots with large outbreaks in the country:

The highest number of such districts are in Tamil Nadu:

1. Chennai

12. Theni

2. Trichy

13. Namakkal

3. Kovai

14. Chengalpattu

4. Tirunelveli

15. Madurai

5. Erode

16. Virudhunagar

6. Vellore

17. Kanyakumari

7. Dindigul

18. Cuddalore

8. Villupuram

19. Tiruvallur

9. Tutucorin

20. Tiruvarur

10. Karur

21. Salem

11. Tiruppur

22. Nagapattinam

Two people died of COVID-19 in Tamil Nadu on April 15, and 38 more tested positive, taking the total number of coronavirus cases in the state to 1,242, Health Minister C Vijayabaskar said. The total number of deaths now stands at 14 in TN.

6 districts in Kerala:

Kasaragod, Kannu, Ernakulam, Malappuram, Thiruvananthapuram, Pathanamthitta.

Kerala reported only one case on April 15, while discharging at least 218 people who recovered from COVID-19, the highest in the country, Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan said.

"Kerala has the highest number of cured cases in the country," Vijayan told reporters in Thiruvananthapuram. However, there is a need to stringently continue the vigil against the pandemic, he said.

Seven people were discharged on Wednesday -- four from Kasaragod, two from Kozhikode and one in Kollam, he said.

3 districts in Karnataka:

Bengaluru urban, Mysuru, Belagavi.

The state witnessed three deaths due to COVID-19 since Sunday, taking the toll to ten.

On Tuesday, 12 tested positive for coronavirus, raising the total number of cases to 260. The Health Department’s bulletin released on April 14 listed a 65-year-old man (Patient 252) with Severe Acute Respiratory Infection (SARI) among the casualties on Monday.

11 districts in Andhra Pradesh:

Kurnool, Guntur, SPSR Nellore, Prakasam, Krishna, Y.S.R, West Godavari, Chittoor, Vishakhapatanam, East Godavari, Anantapur.

The number of COVID-19 positive cases breached the 500 mark in Andhra Pradesh on April 15 with 19 more samples testing positive for the virus. The total number of cases stand at 502 in the state. Two more deaths were reported and this time from Guntur district.

Guntur district continue to top the list with 118 positive cases followed by Kurnool (97) and Nellore (54). According to the media bulletin released today morning, the fresh cases emerged from the samples tested from Tuesday 5 pm to Wednesday 9 am.

11 districts in Maharashtra:

Mumbai, Pune, Thane, Nagpur, Sangli, Ahmednagar, Yavatmal, Aurangabad, Buldhana, Mumbai Suburban, Nashik.

As many as 232 persons tested coronavirus positive in Maharashtra on April 15, taking the tally of such patients in the state to 2,916, a health department official said.

The COVID-19 death toll in the state touched 187 as nine more persons succumbed to the infection on Wednesday. Meanwhile 295 people have been discharged from hospitals in the state till now, he added.

8 districts in Telangana:

Hyderabad, Nizamabad, Warangal Urban, Ranga Reddy, JogulambaGawal, MedchalMalkajgiri, Karimnagar, Nirmal.

According to ANI, with an increase of 52 cases on April 15, the count of COVID-19 positive cases has reached 644 in Telangana, according to the State Health Department.

This includes 18 deaths and 110 cured and discharged patients, as per the official data.

Here are the rest of the state data according to the Ministry of Health.

States/UTs

Number of districts affected

Hotspots

West Bengal

4

Kolkata, Howrah, Medinipur East, 24 Paraganas North

Delhi

9

South, South East, Shadara, West, North, Central, New Delhi, East, South West

Gujarat

5

Ahmedabad, Vadodara, Surat, Bhavnagar, Rajkot

Haryana

4

Nuh, Gurugram, Palwal, Faridabad

Jammu and Kashmir

6

Srinagar, Bandipora, Baramulla, Jammu, Udhampur, Kupwara

Madhya Pradesh

5

Indore, Bhopal, Khargone, Ujjain, Hoshangabad

Punjab

4

S.A.S Nagar, Shahid Bhagat Singh Nagar, Jalandhar, Pathankot

Rajasthan

11

Jaipur, Tonk, Jodhpur, Banswara, Kota, Jhunjunu, Jaisalmer, bhilwara, Bijaner, Jhalawar, Bharatpur

Uttar Pradesh

9

Agra, Gautam Buddha Nagar, Meerut, Lucknow, Ghaziabad, Saharanpur, Shamli, Firozabad, Moradabad

Bihar

1

Siwan

Chandigarh

1

Chandigarh

Chattisgarh

1

Korba

Uttarakhand

1

Dehradun

Odisha

1

Khordha

Here are the list of hotspot districts with clusters

Andaman and Nicobar Islands

South Andamans

Assam

Golaghat, Marigaon, Nalbari, Goalpara, Dhubri

Bihar

Munger, Begusarai, Gaya

Chhattisgarh

Raipur

Delhi

North West

Gujarat

Patan

Haryana

Ambala, Karnal

Himachal Pradesh

Solan, Una, Sirmaur, Chamba, Kangra

Jammu and Kashmir

Shopian, Rajouri

Jharkhand

Ranchi, Bokaro

Karnataka

Dakshina Kannada, Bidar, Kalaburagi, Bagalkote, Dharwad

Kerala

Wayanad

Ladakh

Kargil

Madhya Pradesh

Morena

Maharashtra

Kolhapur, Amravati, Palghar

Odisha

Bhadrak

Punjab

Mansa, Amritsar, Ludhiana, Moga

Rajasthan

Udaipur

Telangana

Nalgonda

Uttar Pradesh

Bulandshahr, Sitapur, Basti, Baghpat,

Uttarakhand

Nainital, Udam Singh Nagar

What is the government going to do?

As the coronavirus brings superpower nations to its knees, India is scrambling to not repeat the mistakes committed by them – by extending lockdown, testing vigorously albeit a bit late as COVID-19 toll here is nearing 12,000.

Earlier in the day, the Joint Secretary in the Ministry of Health, Lav Agarwal, said that the Cabinet secretary held a video conference with all chief secretaries, DGPs, health secretaries, collectors, SPs, municipal commissioners and CMOs and discussed the hotspots and held orientation on the field level implementation of containment strategy.

Quoting Lav Agarwal from PTI, "They were told about large outbreak containment strategies, cluster containment strategies. Delineation of buffer and containment zone, parameter mapping, defining of entry and exit points were also discussed in detail.”

What are Containment zones, Buffer zones?

Containment zone: These are geographical areas from where a large number of cases have been reported and will be identified by the RRT (Rapid Response Teams) who will map the local transmission of the virus in that area. They will demarcate 3 Km area around the epicenter of the virus outbreak, the whole of which will become the containment zone. Movement of public in these areas will be under check to control the spread of the virus.

Photo | Ministry of Health
Photo | Ministry of Health

A buffer zone is the adjoining area of the affected district/rural areas of the COVID affected city.

It is an additional 5 Kms radius (7 Kms in rural areas) of administrative boundary which also includes neighboring districts/per-urban zone, as detailed in the cluster containment plan.

The containment operation, according to the ministry, would be deemed over when there is no case reported in 28 days from an area after the last case tests negative.

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