ROURKELA: With Sundargarh district reporting the highest ever spike in the fourth wave of 197 new COVID-19 infections on Wednesday, the Rourkela Municipal Corporation (RMC) made wearing of mask and following other COVID-19 safety norms mandatory in the city and outside.
Among the fresh cases, 44 persons are from Rourkela alone. The test positivity rate (TPR) stands at 10.52 per cent. Reportedly due to lack of enforcement of COVID regulations at Rourkela and in the district in general, the district has been reporting 103 to 145 cases for the past four days. On June 30, the district had reported 12 cases.
RMC Commissioner Subhankar Mohapatra on Wednesday issued an order making mask wearing mandatory across the city and adherence to COVID-19 appropriate behaviour including physical distancing and hand hygiene.
The RMC move came 16 days later after the Sundargarh Collector Parag Harshad Gavali on July 4 held a review meeting at Rourkela and asked senior administration and health authorities to prep up to curb the surge in cases.
Sundargarh Chief District Medical and Public Health Officer (CDM&PHO) Dr SK Mishra said steps are being taken to contain the spread and ramp up health care system. With the increasing cases, the administration has recently set up dedicated COVID-19 health centres at Sundargarh Government Medical College and Hospital (SGMCH) and Rourkela Government Hospital (RGH) with 30 and 20 beds respectively.
Critical patients with underlying health conditions are getting shifted either to VIMSAR, Burla or SUM Hospital, Bhubaneswar. Meanwhile, active cases in the district rose to 802 from total 92,187 positive cases, of which, 90,698 patients got cured and 682 died due to COVID-19.