COVID-19 takes Minister Suresh Angadi’s life; India home to 90,000 fatalities

New Delhi, Sep 23 (UNI) The COVID-19 situation in India continues to remain grim as in the past 24 hours, over 1,000 patients, including Minister of State for Railways Suresh Angadi, died of the virus. The 65-year old Lok Sabha MP from Belgaum (Belagavi) constituency in Karnataka is the first sitting Minister whose life has been claimed by the virus. He had tested positive on September 11 and was admitted at All India Institute of Medical Sciences.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, expressing grief, wrote on his official twitter handle, “Shri Suresh Angadi was an exceptional Karyakarta, who worked hard to make the Party strong in Karnataka. He was a dedicated MP and effective Minister, admired across the spectrum. His demise is saddening.’

The pandemonium triggered due to the pandemic is seen far from over in India with consistent rise in cases and deaths since a few days. The overall death toll has now reached a grim milestone of 90,000.

In the past 24 hours, as per Union Health Ministry, the fresh deaths were 1,085 while cases 83,347.

India, the world’s second most populous country and second-worst hit nation in terms of cases, has a very good track record of recovery. Even in the past one day, 89,746 patients got a new lease of life after they were cured and discharged.

Earlier in the day, Mr Modi chaired a high-level meeting with Chief Ministers and Health Ministers of seven states and UTs to review Covid-19 response and management. Chief ministers of Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Uttar Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Delhi and Punjab attended the meeting.

Numbers

The fresh cases breakup is Maharahshtra – 18,390, Karnataka – 6974, Andhra Pradesh – 7553, Uttar Pradesh – 5650, Tamil Nadu – 5337, Kerala – 4125, Odisha – 4189, Delhi – 3816, West Bengal 3182 and Chhattisgarh – 2736.

India has a sizable population of 1.3 billion people, which, according to experts, has been the prime reason for such huge cases.

The country has also been testing aggressively, with as many as 9,53,683 samples being tested in the past 24 hours.

Ten states

The Centre has asked 10 key states contributing 76 per cent of all reported cases to implement targeted public communication campaigns at the grass root level to encourage ‘Covid appropriate behaviour’ among the people in the worst-affected districts.

These 10 states are Maharashtra, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Tamilnadu, Chhattisgarh, Odisha, Kerala, Telangana and Delhi which have maximum number of active cases. Within Maharashtra, Mumbai, Thane, Pune, Nashik, Nagpur, Sangli and Kolhapur have been identified as key districts for intensive Covid communication.

Meanwhile, the Government of Maharashtra has already launched a direct contact campaign “Maaze Kutumb, Maazi Jababdari” (My Family, My Responsibility) aimed at effective health care education for the control of Covid 19 outbreak. This campaign, being conducted in two phases during September and October has an ambitious target of reaching out to 2.25 crore households twice.

Delhi’s Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia was admitted to the state-run LNJP Hospital in Delhi due to coronavirus.

The 48-year-old Aam Aadmi Party leader had tested positive for the infection on September 14 and was since then in home isolation.

Saudi Global

Saudi Arabia suspended air travel to and from India, Brazil and Argentina, in view of the COVID-19 pandemic, the country’s Civil Aviation Authority said on Wednesday.

As per the latest update from Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University, so far 3,16,30,912 COVID-19 cases have been registered across the world with 68,97,432 in US, 45,91,364 in Brazil, 11,17,487 in Russia, 7,77,537 in Columbia, 7,68,895 in Peru, 7,05,263 in Mexico, 6,82,267 in Spain, 6,63,282 in South Africa and 90,908 in China.

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here