BHUBANESWAR: In a major cluster outbreak of COVID-19 in the Capital city, 18 employees of a hotel along Jaydev Vihar road tested positive for coronavirus in the last 24 hours. The city also reported one more COVID-19 fatality taking the death toll to 23.
BMC sources said the outbreak occurred after one of the employees infected with the virus came in contact with other staff. The employees, however, had been put in quarantine during contact tracing, an official of the civic body said.
The cluster spread raised concern underlining the need for further strengthening of measures in hotels to check spread of the virus. Hotels in the city have been allowed to function with 30 per cent capacity and strict social distancing measures without dine-in service. However, there are many areas where the State Government and civic body are required to take corrective measures.
Though hospitals had been asked by the BMC to provide accommodation to their employees coming from slum areas to contain spread of the virus effectively, no such advisory has been issued for the hotels.
However, Municipal Commissioner Prem Chandra Chaudhary said that the hotels have been asked to create isolation facility for those testing positive. A total 187 new cases were reported in the city in the last 24 hours taking the tally to 4,358. The new cases included 104 patients who were under quarantine and 83 locals.
Other than the hotel, the quarantine cases included 12 employees from two private hospitals, five persons from Chandrasekharpur BDA Colony and three persons from Mahavir slum. The cases of local transmission, on the other hand, include three patients each from Laxmisagar Refugee Colony, Sailashree Vihar and Satya Nagar.
The BMC has not provided any details on their source of infection, though it stated that their primary and secondary contacts have been quarantined and will be under surveillance for a week or two. As many as 107 persons recovered in the last 24 hours.