NEW DELHI, Apr 13: In India, the situation in the State of Maharashtra,
especially its Capital city of Mumbai crammed with people nowhere to go, continues to be a cause of concern with the number of coronavirus (covid-19) cases shooting up day by day even as most States have extended the lockdown till April 30. The three-week lockdown announced by the Centre on March 24 ends on April 14. The Central decision on a national lockdown extension may be known when Prime Minister Narendra Modi addresses
the nation on Tuesday at 10 AM.
Maharashtra is topping in death rate in the country. It has clocked 149 fatalities
so far. The numbers are climbing steeply. The total cases has soared to 2,334
with an alarming number of 352 new cases of which more than half were reported
from Mumbai. The second worst-hit State continues to be Madhya Pradesh with
a total of 43 deaths.
With the highest density of population, with millions and millions of migrants struggling to survive somehow on its teeming streets, with a burgeoning middle and lower middle class packed into congested slots, Mumbai the financial capital of India is a tinderbox that will explode anytime if the corona situation worsens and goes out of control. In the words of Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray, the city is so terribly congested that ten workers live in one room of 10x10 sq ft space.
Most of the deaths in the State are from Mumbai. Of the 352 new cases in the
State the city accounts for 242. After Mumbai, Pune is the next worst affected
in the State with 39 new cases.
The total count of covid cases in the country as on Monday was 9,352, as per
the data provided by the Health Ministry at 5 pm. There were 51 deaths in the
country in the last 24 hours due to coronavirus infection. The total deaths
stand at 324. The number of covid tests conducted so far has gone up to 2,06,212,
according to ICMR data. There are stocks of kits that will last for six weeks.
Across the world, the US remains the worst affected with number of deaths and
new cases spiralling without any let-up, especially in New York, where the situation
continues alarming.
Apart from the mammoth contact-tracing and quarantine exercises, various State
Governments are also identifying hotspot areas where cases occur and seal such
zones.
The covid cases reached 1,176 in Delhi, while in Tamil Nadu it was 1,075. The
Capital recorded 24 casualties so far.
As per data available for the evening, the State-wise breakup of cases is as
follows. Yesterday's figures are given in bracket:-
Andhra Pradesh: 432 (381 cases, 6 deaths)
Andaman and Nicobar Island 11 (no change)
Arunachal Pradesh 1 (no change)
Assam 31 (29 - 1 death)
Bihar 64 (63 -1 death)
Chandigarh 21 (19)
Chhattisgarh 31 (18)
Delhi 1154 (1069 - 19 deaths)
Goa 7 (no change)
Gujarat 539 (432 -22 deaths)
Haryana 185 (177 -3 deaths)
Himachal Pradesh 32 (1 death) (no change)
Jammu and Kashmir 245 (207 -4 deaths)
Jharkhand 19 (17 -1 death)
Karnataka 247 (214 -6 deaths)
Kerala 376 (364 -2 deaths) Ladakh 15 (no change)
Madhya Pradesh 604 (532 -36 deaths)
Maharashtra 1985 (1761)
Manipur 2 (no change)
Mizoram 1 (no change)
Odisha 54 (50 -1 death)
Puducherry 7 (no change)
Punjab 167 (151 -11 deaths)
Rajasthan 812 (700 -3 deaths)
Tamil Nadu 1075 (969 -10 deaths)
Telangana 564 (9 deaths) (no change)
Tripura 2 (no change)
Uttarakhand 35 (no change)
Uttar Pradesh 483 (452 -5 deaths)
West Bengal 152 (134 -5 deaths)