HYDERABAD: It seems like the State government has not learnt its lessons from the Nalgonda bypoll and Khammam local bodies elections, when it comes to keeping a tab on the spread of Covid-19 infections. After the elections, a sharp spike in Covid-19 cases was seen, and the ripple effect of the incident is continuing even after three months.
Replicating the same pattern, the virus is now making inroads into Karimnagar piggybacking on the election campaigns which are being held for the Huzurabad bypolls. A case in point is the gradual spike in cases across July. A look at the previous month shows that between June 17 to 30, the district saw 941 cases, which was part of the second wave.
In July first week, the numbers dropped and 700 cases were seen in the next 14 days. However, owing to the intense political campaigning in the last 14 days, again a spike is being seen. The caseload in the last 14 days just in Karimnagar has reached 876. This is in contrast to the trend in the rest of the State where cases have been going down. It may be recalled that in Nalgonda and Khammam, a similar spike was seen after the elections were held in Haliya constituency and in Khammam local body elections.
“The current surge in cases in Karimnagar district will certainly contribute to the coming of third wave. To what extent it will hasten the third wave will be known only by August second to third week,” said Dr BN Reddy, State Secretary, IMA Telangana. He also said that the only way out was to vaccinate 80 per cent of the people and ensure mortality rate was lowered, if not infections. “Vaccinations won’t completely cut infection spread, but will help reduce mortality. So at least 70 to 80 per cent of the eligible population must be vaccinated on a war footing. More importantly, masks have to be enforced amongst local leaders, party workers as that is the only way to cut transmission,” he added. Only 3.55 lakh first doses have been given in the district so far.
623 cases, 3 Covid-19 deaths in Telangana
Another 623 new cases of Covid-19 were recorded in Telangana on Wednesday after 1.12 lakh tests were conducted. With this, the State’s active cases are at 8,803 now. The day also saw a drop in daily recoveries with 594 individuals recovering from the virus. The highest cases were reported in Greater Hyderabad with 77 cases, followed by Karimnagar with 65 cases, Warangal Urban with 59 cases and Khammam reported 52 cases. There were three deaths reported in the day, taking the pandemic toll to 3,814.