COURTESY HT OCT  1`3

In Haryana, urban belt hit more than rural by coronavirus

Hitender Rao

hrao@hindustantimes.com

Chandigarh : Urban areas in Haryana have outnumbered rural pockets in terms of Covid-19 mortality rate. The rural areas have registered 28% Covid-19 mortality rate as compared to about 72% in urban areas, a significantly higher proportion of virus spread.

Though three districts—Sonepat, Nuh and Jhajjar—have reported higher number of deaths in rural areas, the remaining 19 districts have reported more fatalities in urban areas.

As per the latest health department statistics, 1,150 infected patients from urban centres have died so far as compared to 429 from rural areas. The total number of fatalities reported till October 11 was 1,579.

Health officials said the trend that virus had a far wider spread in urban areas was also evident from findings of the serological survey conducted in August.

Additional chief secretary (ACS), health, Rajeev Arora said serological positivity of urban areas was also found to be higher at 9.59% as compared to 6.90% in rural areas.

“The reasons behind higher rate of infection and deaths in urban areas are high density of population, intermingling and socialising, people’s tendency to dump safety measures and large scale movement of people. In comparison, people in rural areas have showed better adherence to safety measures. During lockdown, the residents did not allow outsiders to enter the villages,” the ACS said.Data shows that 58% of the dead were senior citizens (above 60) and about 47% had multiple comorbidities. Only 16% of those who died did not have any comorbidity, as per the data. “About 57% infected patients were on ventilator when they died while 21% were put on oxygen support. Around 15% patients were on bi-level positive airway pressure,” an official said.

Infection rate down for third consecutive week

For the third consecutive week, number of infections continued to drop. The state reported 8,277 infections last week (October 5-11) as compared to 10,096 the week before, a reduction of 1,819 cases.

The state had reported 2,429 lesser infections between September 28 to October 4 as compared to September 21 to 27. There was a decline of over 5,000 infections between September 21 and 27. The state had reported an all-time high of 17,616 cases between September 14-20.

Statistics show that though the health authorities stepped up sampling last week, testing 16,606 more people than the last week, yet more than 15,000 of the tests were done using rapid antigen kits.

13 DEATHS, 1,066 FRESH CASES REPORTED

Haryana on Monday recorded 13 fatalities and 1,066 Covid-19 infections, the health bulletin stated. The death toll has mounted to 1,592 and the total number of positive cases have risen to 1,43,221.

Of the 13 deaths, three people succumbed to the virus in Hisar, two each in Bhiwani, Sirsa, Panipat and Jhajjar districts and one each in Gurugram and Kurukshetra. Also, 1,225 more patients have been cured, taking overall recoveries to 1,31,228. Active cases stand at 10,401