Punjab schools report spurt in Covid cases, cause major concern

Nitin Jain

Tribune News Service

Ludhiana, February 25

The sudden spurt in Covid cases in the schools has become a major cause of concern for parents and managements of the educational institutions besides the district administration.

Ludhiana, which had earlier assumed the dubious distinction of Covid capital of Punjab, has topped the state with highest virus positivity in the schools.

Against the state’s average positivity rate of 1.1 per cent, Ludhiana has recorded a whopping 4 per cent Covid positive students and school staffers, the official figures compiled by the Health Department have revealed.

Ludhiana is one of the seven districts in the state which were showing high positivity of Covid cases, according to the current pandemic situation in the state since January 4, compiled by the government and presented before CM Capt Amarinder Singh recently.

The presentation, a copy of which is with The Tribune, showed that 149 Covid positive cases, including 98 students and 51 teachers, were reported from around 3,700 samples taken in 26 schools of Ludhiana.

The second highest positivity rate of 2.9 per cent was reported in Bathinda where 59 of the total 2,061 samples collected from 48 schools had tested positive.

Nawanshahr stood third with 2.7 per cent positivity rate in schools.

Chief Secretary Vini Mahajan said, “The state government is fully equipped and prepared to combat the possible fresh wave but the citizens should also follow appropriate Covid behaviour to protect themselves and others from the pandemic. Besides re-enforcing the restrictions on gatherings and strict enforcement of mask wearing and social distancing, testing has also been ramped up in the state.”

In the state, 723 of the total 64,574 samples taken from 1,392 schools had tested positive. These included 452 students and 271 teachers.

While eight districts in the state had reported less than 1 per cent Covid positive rate in schools, four districts had recorded between 1 and 2 per cent positivity rate.

With the cumulative positivity rate of 3.69 per cent as on February 21, the state’s positivity rate rose from 1.25 per cent between January 4 and 10 to 1.72 per cent between February 15 and 21.

While the active cases shot up from 2,933 between January 4 and 10 to 3,019 on February 21, the number of positive cases piled up from 1,845 between January 4 and 10 to 2,182 between February 15 and 21, taking the cumulative count to 1,78,459.

The sampling came down from 1,47,161 of which 1,845 tested positive between January 4 and 10 to 1,26,875 of which 2,182 turned positive between February 15 and 21.

The fatalities also kept going up and down from 45 between January 4-10 to 60 between January 25-31 to again falling down to 57 between February 5-21.

The number of discharged patients came down from 1,683 between January 4-10 to 1,447 between February 15-21. The contact/ case ratio rose from 12.3 between January 3-9 to 16.6 between February 15-21.

Meanwhile, Hussan Lal, Health Secretary, said, “The recent spike in positivity rate, especially in Amritsar, Hoshiarpur, Jalandhar, Ludhiana, Patiala, Mohali and Nawanshahr in recent days, has triggered concerns over a possible fresh wave in the state, following which we are on a high alert and proactively taking all requisite steps to contain the further spread of the pandemic in the state.”