VIJAYAWADA: As many as 271 people tested positive in Krishna district on Thursday, taking the corona count to 6,530. The COVID toll rose to 160 with three more persons falling victim to the virus. At present, the number of active cases in the district is 1,821, while 4,549 people have recovered from coronavirus.
A total of 114 persons were discharged from COVID hospitals in the last 24 hours ending at 9 am on Thursday.
In a review meeting held at his camp office here, Collector A Md Imtiaz said that over one lakh people from various parts of the country and abroad have returned to Krishna district since the outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic.
Of the total, 42,459 people arrived in the district by special trains and 36,000 by buses. A record number of 23,400 people returned from abroad. He said that about 4,700 natives of Krishna district reached Hyderabad from abroad and they were shifted to their hometowns by special buses.
Elaborating further, the Collector said that instructions were given to the officials concerned to collect samples from the people who arrived in the district from high risk places like New Delhi, Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, Gujarat, Rajasthan and Punjab.
They were given a choice of staying in paid quarantine or in centres run by the State government. Only 5 per cent of samples were collected randomly from the people returned from Hyderabad. With the spurt in corona positive cases in Telangana, the collection of samples was increased to 10 per cent.
"Many people who returned from Kuwait, tested positive for the virus. All of them are being treated in quarantine centres in the district," Imtiaz said, adding that the sample testing was ramped up by deploying iMASQ buses at Vijayawada railway station, Gannavaram airport and Garikapadu checkpost.
People who tested positive, are being shifting to COVID hospitals or sent to home isolation after the seven-day institutional quarantine.