A bored truck driver's attempt to kill time by indulging in a game of cards with his friends and neighbours led to the infection of coronavirus in 24 people in one locality of Vijayawada city in Andhra Pradesh, Krishna district Collector A Md Imtiaz said on Saturday.
A social group for whiling away time by another truck driver resulted in the virus affliction to about 15 people in another locality in Vijayawada. These two instances accounted for about 40 cases in the city in the last couple of days, he said.
While the source of infection is not known, officials say lack of social distancing was the main reason for the spread in these two cases.
In the first instance, the truck driver in Krishna Lanka locality was bored and played cards with his friends and neighbours while the women grouped up and played tambola. All this resulted in the spread of the dreaded virus in 24 people, he said.
"The same thing happened in Karmika Nagar. The truck driver moved around socialising and in the process about 15 people got afflicted," Imtiaz added.
Failure to maintain physical distance was the sole cause for the transmission of the coronavirus in these cases, he said in a recorded video message.
Vijayawada is one of the major hotspots of coronavirus in the state where over 100 cases have been registered so far.
Between Friday and Saturday alone, 25 fresh cases were reported in the city. The Collector appealed to people to strictly maintain physical distance to avoid the infection.
Meanwhile, Andhra Pradesh's overall positive cases of coronavirus stood at 1,016 on Saturday, with 61 new cases detected between 10 am on Friday and 10 am on Saturday. The death toll reached 31 with two more people passing away, while Srikakulam district, which did not have a single case till date, reported three cases.
Vizianagaram is now the only district in the state not to be affected by COVID-19, yet.
Andhra Pradesh still has 814 active coronavirus cases after the discharge of 171 patients and the death of 31. Between Friday and Saturday, 6,928 samples were tested -- the highest in a single day in the state so far, while the aggregate number of tests till date was 61,266.
PTI inputs