Kerala witnessed spikein COVID-19 cases for the second day in a row with 11 people testing positive on Wednesday, taking the tally of active cases to 127, Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan said.He hailed the Centre's decision to bring out an ordinance making acts of violence against health workers involved in the COVID-19 battle as cognizable andnon-bailable offences.After reporting cases in single digit and higher number of recoveries for some days, Kerala recorded a spurt on Tuesday with 19 people testing positive and 11 on Wednesday.Seven out of the 11 new cases were from Kannur District, which has emerged as the latest hotspot for the coronavirus accounting for 61 cases, and two were from Kozhikode.One new case each was detectedfrom Malappuram and Kottayam, a Green Zone, while one person was cured in the state, the Chief Minister said."With the 11 new cases, the total number of Covid-19 affected persons in the state has gone up to 437. One personwho was reported cured is from Palakkad district. A total of 29,150 people are under observationin the state with 346 in isolation wards at various hospitals," Vijayan told reporters here.So far 20,821 samples have been sent for testing."Three of today's 11 cases had contracted the virus through contacts while five cases were of foreign returnees. One case is a health worker and two are house surgeons of Kozhikode Medical College who came to the state from outside Kerala," he said.The two doctors had travelled to Kerala from Delhi in a train before the nationwide lockdown.Vijayan welcomed the Centre's decision to bring out an ordinance making acts of violence against health workersas cognizable andnon-bailable offences."We welcome the ordinance," he said, reacting to the union cabinet decision which met a key demand of health professionals in the wake of recent attacks on them in various parts of the country.On the situation in Kannur, his native district, Vijayan said stringent implementation of lockdown protocol will be in place in the northern district, where 61 cases have been reported, the highest in the state at present."The hotspots in the state are completely sealed. In Kannur, 437 cases were registered and 347 vehicles seized for violating lockdown protocol," he added.He also announced the state has decided to set aside a part of the salary of the government employees to fight the pandemic."The state cabinet has decided to set aside six days salary for five months of all government employees except those who have monthly salary less than Rs 20,000 and it will be added to the CMDRF."This amount will be given back to the employees when the financial condition of the state improves," Vijayan said.Ministers, MLAs, members of various commissionsand boards among others will contribute their 30 per centsalary for a year to help the state which is facing a severefinancial crisis.The Chief Minister also remembered Russian revolutionary leader Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov, better known by his alias Lenin, on his 150th birth anniversary.The Marxist leader recalled how Lenin, who served as the head of government of Soviet Russia and Soviet Union from 1917 to 1924, urged the countries to battle the Spanish Flu during the First World War and drew a comparsion with the situation the world was facing now due to COVID-19 pandemic.
