Return of migrant workers leads to fresh round of Covid-19 infections in Uttarakhand

The state health department has classified all the 13 districts under the orange zone. Just a few days earlier, only six districts were in the orange zone and the remaining six under green zones.

On Tuesday, 51 new cases have been detected, of which 44 are people who returned from Meerut, Delhi, Mumbai, Jalandhar and Chandigarh.

Of the 329 active cases, 227 are in the hill districts, including 126 in Nainital, 12 in Almora, 11 in Chamoli, 25 in Tehri Garhwal and 17 in Pithoragarh. According to state officials, over 1.54 lakh people have already returned in the last two weeks and another 3.5 lakh are expected to come back over the next few days.

With maximum cases being detected in those returning from Mumbai and Delhi, officials have been directed to test everyone coming back from these cities.

With the return of migrants in Shramik trains, the doubling rate of cases has reduced to four days from 40 days on May 5. So far, four people have died in the state. However, officials claimed that three of them died due to diseases other than Covid-19 while the reason could not be ascertained in the case of the fourth.

In Nainital, which has the highest number of active cases in the state, 7921 migrants have reached rural areas so far. About 5493 of them have been asked to quarantine themselves at home while the remaining 2428 have been put in institutional quarantine facilities. In urban areas, 6479 migrants have reached till now.

Chief Minister Trivendra Singh Rawat on Sunday visited Srinagar in Pauri Garhwal district to inspect and review the preparations for Covid-19 outbreak management. On Monday, CM toured Rudrapur in Udham Singh Nagar and Haldwani in Nainital district.