5 districts of Punjab cause for concern

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, May 12

Even as the state continues to battle the second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic, five districts have emerged as a big worry for the government. These worst-affected districts have reported 1.07 lakh cases and 1407 deaths in the past one month.

The state has reported a total of 1.83 lakh cases and 3,359 deaths in the past one month. Of this, Ludhiana, SAS Nagar, Jalandhar, Patiala and Bathinda districts alone have contributed 58.7 per cent of the total cases and 42 per cent of all deaths.

Among the districts, Ludhiana topped the chart with 36,357 cases and 398 deaths; followed by SAS Nagar with 25,147 cases and 237 deaths; Jalandhar reported 16,067 cases and 195 deaths; Bathinda 15,455 cases and 279 deaths; Patiala 14,435 cases and 298 deaths.

Even the test positivity rate of these districts is very high. State’s overall positivity rate is 13.7 per cent. Most of the worst-affected districts have the positivity rate close to 20 per cent.

The first Covid case and death was reported in March last year. Since then, 4,59,268 cases and 10,918 deaths have been reported. At present, the state has 76,858 active cases. When it comes to the fatality rate, Punjab is consistently figuring on top with 2.4 deaths per 100 cases.