Uttar Pradesh restricts number of indoor event attendees; COVID-19 tally reaches 5,28,833

LUCKNOW: The Uttar Pradesh government on Monday restricted the number of people attending an indoor event to 100, while less than 40 per cent of the area of an outdoor programme venue will be allowed to be occupied by people in view of the COVID-19 outbreak.
However, in both the scenarios, use of face masks, sanitisers, thermal scanning and maintaining social distancing remain intact, an official said.

Additional Chief Secretary, Medical and Health, Amit Mohan Prasad told reporters that 50 per cent of the capacity of an indoor place, be it a hall or a room (outside containment zones), but not exceeding 100 people, has been allowed in case of any social, religious, cultural, sports, educational, entertainment and political programme or wedding.

Earlier, 200 people were allowed in a hall, room or any indoor place.

Similarly in the case of outdoor programmes, less than 40 per cent of the area of the venue will be allowed to be occupied by people, Prasad said.

When asked to clarify on COVID-19 testing to be conducted on people coming to Uttar Pradesh, Additional Chief Secretary (Information) Navneet Sehgal said, "Random checking of people coming to Uttar Pradesh by rail, bus or air will be done."

He also said that barring five districts, the COVID-19 cases have come down in other regions of the state. The five districts are Gautam Buddh Nagar, Ghaziabad, Meerut, Kanpur and Lucknow, he said.

Uttar Pradesh Chief Secretary R K Tiwari had on Sunday said that the state government would test all travellers from Delhi for coronavirus infection.

On the status of COVID-19 cases in the state in the past 24 hours, Prasad said 2,067 fresh cases were reported, taking the infection tally to 5,28,833. Of the fresh cases, the state capital reported 315 cases followed by 208 cases in Meerut, 160 in Gautam Buddh Nagar, 126 in Ghaziabad and 125 in Kanpur.

He said with 23 more COVID-19 fatalities, the death toll climbed to 7,582. Of these latest fatalities, three deaths were reported from Mainpuri, while two deaths each were reported from Lucknow, Kanpur, Varanasi and Meerut.

In the past 24 hours, as many as 2,060 coronavirus patients in the state recovered from the viral disease, and so far 4,97,475 people have recovered from the disease.

The count of active COVID-19 cases in the state stands at 23,776, Prasad said.

He also said the case fatality rate of the state is 1.43 per cent.

Over 1.45 lakh samples were tested for COVID-19 on Sunday. More than 1.81 crore samples have so far been tested in the state, Prasad added.

Meanwhile, Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath lauded the contribution of everyone involved in the task of dealing with the coronavirus pandemic in the state and said their efforts have also been acknowledged at the global level.

Now, there is no problem as far as testing is concerned, he said, adding that a total of 1.80 crore COVID-19 tests have so far been conducted in the state and the capacity will further improve.

Adityanath also directed the officials to make advance preparations for the administration of COVID-19 vaccine to people.

"A concrete arrangement of cold chain for vaccine preservation should be ensured in all districts by December 15," he said addressing a review meeting at his residence.