Gautam Buddha Nagar reported the second death due to COVID-19 in 24 hours on Friday night, an official release has said.
Official sources said that the deceased, a resident of Sector 66, was lodged at Galgotia University hostel, a quarantine facility.
He was brought dead at around 10.45 p.m., said Rakesh Gupta, Director, Government Institute of Medical Sciences (GIMS).
The 62-year-old’s sample was taken on Thursday and his report came out on Friday evening. He was found unconscious in his room in the evening and was rushed to GIMS. “The cause of the death is cardio-respiratory attack,” said Sunil Dohre, District Surveillance Officer.
On Thursday night, a 60-year-old resident of Sector 22 died due to respiratory issues after contracting COVID-19. He was admitted to a private hospital in Sector 11 on Monday and was shifted to GIMS after he tested positive for the virus on Thursday.
With one more positive case on Saturday, Gautam Buddh Nagar now has 216 COVID-19 cases. Out of these, 93 are active cases.
In a related development, Chief Medical Officer Deepak Ohri informed that the 42 samples whose test reports were found to be inconclusive at GIMS on May 5, were sent for re-test to the National Institute of Biological Sciences and all of them were found to be negative on Saturday.
Questions were raised about the quality of testing at GIMS and the integrity of officials after a number of reports were found to be inconclusive. “We are working with complete transparency and people should not pay heed to rumours,” said Dr. Ohri.
