GUNTUR: Two autorickshaw drivers, one from Gandhi Nagar in Nuzvid and the other from Pothireddypally village, are among the 12 persons from Krishna district who tested positive for coronavirus on Saturday, taking the district’s total cases to 258.
Officials said one of the drivers had come in contact with a vegetable vendor, who was found to be a carrier himself on April 28. He was shifted to the state Covid-19 hospital in Vijayawada and his family was shifted to a quarantine centre.
Nuzvid sub collector Swapnil Dinakar Pundakar said following the positive cases reported in the last couple of days, wards 23, 24, 25, 26, 27 and 28 were declared red zones and the entire town was disinfected with sodium hypochlorite solution on Saturday. Special check posts were arranged in Agiripalli village.
Meanwhile, the remaining ten cases were from Vijayawada. Among them, six cases were from Krishna Lanka, and one each from Karmika Nagar, Nunna and Chitti Nagar localities. In Nunna, an elderly woman tested positive, and officials said she didn’t have any travel history and might have contracted the virus from another infectee. In Krishna Lanka and Karmika Nagar, positive cases were reported among persons who came in contact with a lorry driver and a foreign returnee.
Collector A Md Imtiaz said geographical quarantine procedure was being followed in the city to prevent the further spread of Covid-19. “Instructions have been given to the officials concerned to strengthen vigil at Karmika Nagar, Krishna Lanka, Ajith Singh Nagar, Vidyadharapuram and Khuddus Nagar by using the procedure.” “Lack of social distancing and public violating the lockdown norms are the major reasons for the spread of the virus in the respective localities,” he observed. Speaking about the medical preparedness in the district, the collector added medical teams have collected 12,113 samples so far, of which 10,289 tested negative and reports of 1566 samples were yet to arrive.