Total number of COVID-19 infections have crossed 700-mark in Karnataka, where 12 new positive cases including a fatality were reported, taking the toll in the state to 30, as the government said on Thursday that future of the lockdown was in the hands of the people.
"It is important that this lockdown-3 is successful.
As many economic activities related to agriculture, industries have been allowed during the ongoing lockdown, it is upto the people to help control coronavirus as well as ensure the financial development," state Home Minister Basavaraj Bommai said.
Speaking to reporters here, he said if the people could make sure that lockdown-3 was successful, there would no need for it to continue.
"If lockdown-3 does not yield results according to our expectations, it will be inevitable for the state and central governments to take different measures," Bommai, who is also the member of state's COVID-19 task force said.
He also appealed to the people to make the third lockdown successful by following government directives.
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According to health department bulletin, as of 5:00 PM on May 7, cumulatively 705 COVID-19 positive cases have been confirmed in the state, it includes 30 deaths and 366 discharges.
It said, out of 308 active cases, 302 patients are in isolation at designated hospitals and are stable, while 6 are in ICU.
Twelve patients who have recovered were discharged on Thursday.
A 55-year-old woman from Davanagere became the 30th COVID-19 related fatality in the state.
The deceased woman was a known case of diabetes and hypertension, she was admitted with complaint of Severe Acute Respiratory Infection (SARI) and was on ventilator, the department said.
She died today at designated hospital in Davanagere, it said.
Twelve new cases reported include three from Davangere, indulging the deceased patient; also three each from Kalaburagi and Badami (Bagalkote), and one each from Hirebagewadi in Belagavi district, Bengaluru urban and Dharwad.
While seven cases are contacts of patients earlier tested positive, four are with history of Influenza Like Illness (ILI) and one is a SARI case.
Eight among 12 new cases are women and four are men.
Contact tracing has been initiated and is in progress for all the cases, the department said.
From across the state most number of infections have been reported in Bengaluru urban with 156 cases, followed by Mysuru 88 and Belagavi 72.
Out of total 366 patients discharged so far, maximum 81 are from Mysuru, 77 from Bengaluru urban, thirty four from Belagavi.
A total of 93,535 samples were tested so far, out of which 4,758 were tested on Thursday alone.
So far 87,756 samples have reported as negative, and out of them 4,700 were reported negative on Thursday.
Meanwhile, Karnataka Chief Minister B S Yediyurappa directed commercial tax department officials to take strict measures to control tax leakages, with economic activities restarting in the state after easing of COVID-19 induced lockdown.
He asked officials to initiate action against those using fake E-Way Bill, misuse of time given for movement of freight, CMO in a release said.
The state government wrote to nine states, including Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Jharkhand, seeking their coordination in receiving the labourers who are stranded in the state, after receiving flak from various sections for cancelling trains for transporting migrant workers.
State Revenue Department Principal Secretary N Manjunath Prasad has written to the nodal officers of nine states (Bihar, Jharkhand, UP, Manipur, Tripura, West Bengal, MP, Rajasthan, Odisha) seeking to receive the migrant labourers.
With documents showing that consent has been received to run one special train to Bihar and MP everyday from May 8-15, sources said, first train is likely to depart to these states on Friday.
Responding to a query in this connection, Minister Suresh Kumar, who is government spokesperson for COVID-19 related developments said, basically labourers at the construction sites would be ones who are eligible for this.
"Their list based on Aadhar card details are available at the police station, so it is clear, and there is information of those who are eager to go, so based on that, once train schedules are prepared they will be transported from construction sites to railway stations," he said.