No community transmission yet, say Karnataka Health Dept officials on COVID-19

Speaking with reporters on Saturday, Deputy CM Govind Karjol had said that the disease has reached the third stage of community transmission.
No community transmission yet, say Karnataka Health Dept officials on COVID-19
No community transmission yet, say Karnataka Health Dept officials on COVID-19

Even though the Deputy Chief Minister on Saturday said that the coronavirus infection spread has reached Stage-III (community transmission stage), Karnataka Health department officials say the state is still in stage two. Officials said only by the end of next week, subsequent assessment will tell if the situation has worsened.

“Today, the coronavirus epidemic has entered the third phase. By and large people are cooperating," PTI quoted Deputy Chief Minister Govind Karjol as saying on Saturday, in Bagalkote district of north Karnataka.

A release by the National Health Mission said that doctors in Karnataka are confident that the state can avoid the potential community transmission stage with the right combination of medical and socio-economic norms, along with responsible public behaviour.

Dr Prakash Kumar, State Joint Director, Communicable Diseases, said, “While effective measures to stop the spread of COVID-19 have been put in place in the state, the coming week is very crucial for us. If there is a spike in the number of new cases, then we will have to scale up our efforts even further to combat the virus.”

“We are not yet in the community stage, where there will be large scale spreading of the disease and in order to avoid that, it is very critical that the public respect the lockdown ordered by the Government and do not step out of their houses, unless it is absolutely necessary. Even if they do come out for essential items, the public have to maintain social distancing. Those people who have been put under home quarantine should strictly observe the instructions that have been given to them by the Health Department and behave in a responsible manner, so as not to allow the disease to be passed on to others,” he added.

Meanwhile, the number of patients testing positive for coronavirus (COVID-19) has reached 83, according to the Karnataka government bulletin released on Sunday.

This includes two new patients from Udupi district and five patients from Mysuru district. The developments regarding the Mysuru patients were confirmed by the district authority, post the release of the bulletin on Saturday.

The bulletin said that among the two Udupi men, a 35-year-old has a travel history to Dubai and had reached his native place on March 17. The other man, a 29-year-old, has no known foreign travel history but had visited Thiruvananthapuram.

He is incidentally the third person in the state to test positive for COVID-19 without having relevant foreign travel history.

As reported earlier, all the five cases in Mysuru are contacts and co-workers of the quality assurance department worker who had tested positive earlier.

While that person did not have any history of foreign travel or contact with a COVID-19 positive person, health officials said he was in touch with health personnel working to combat the pandemic.

However, department officials maintain that there has been no community transmission.

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