State Covid-19 tally crosses 52,000 as SMC clerk and nurse die in Surat

Sunil Nimavat (46), the nurse, tested positive around 15 days ago. He was on ventilator for the last 10 days and breathed his last on Thursday afternoon.

Jaydev Solanki (50), a clerk working with the Surat Municipal Corporation’s Varachha zone office, was undergoing treatment in the SMIMER hospital for the last 10 days.

In another case, Jayotiben Solanki (52), working as clerk in central zone office, who was also infected 10 days ago and was undergoing treatment at SMIMER hospital, died on Wednesday.

With the daily caseload rising over the past few weeks in Surat, badly affected are the frontline workers. Sources said that over 200 municipal officials of SMC have tested positive so far, out of which five workers have died of the infection. At New Civil Hospital, out of 50 nurses and doctors who tested positive so far, two nurses have died. Eighty policemen have also tested positive out of which two constables have died.

Surat Municipal Commissioner B N Pani said, “There are 22,000 employees in SMC, and out of them 200 employees have already tested positive. The reason why the figure is so high is that SMC employees are always working in war zone areas like cluster areas, containment zones and micro containment zones.”

Ahmedabad, which reported 210 cases taking the tally to more than 25,000 cases in the district, saw a spike in the rural side where 23 tested positive. The rural jurisdiction also reported a death. Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation (AMC) added 17 new micro containment zones while delisting 10 others. With an increased focus on antigen testing by AMC, Ahmedabad tested nearly 3,700 samples, a majority of which were antigen tests.

Botad, which has seen a surge in cases of late, reported a death for the second consecutive day while seven others tested positive. Of the 181 cases reported from here till date, 52 are currently undergoing treatment. Two patients succumbed in Kutch as well as Patan. Both these districts are rapidly adding more cases with Patan reporting a higher case fatality rate of nearly 5.3 per cent.

While Rajkot and Bhavnagar combined added around a 100 cases, tribal district of Narmada and Dahod saw a total of 70 more test positive, Narmada seeing its highest single-day surge with 40 cases.

In Vadodara, 82 tested positive taking the total here to 3,919, while nearly 600 samples were tested on Thursday. While Vadodara Municipal Corporation declared three deaths after an audit, the state only reported two.

With inputs from KAMAAL SAIYED