The district recorded 391 new COVID-19 cases in the last 24 hours, taking the cumulative tally to 64,865 as on Saturday morning. Consecutively for the second day, the day-tally has crossed the 300-mark. This is also the highest single-day tally since the last six months. The district has reported third highest day-tally after Chittoor (741) and Guntur (527) districts in the last 24 hours.
The total number of cases reported this April is 2,526. On an average, as many as 252 cases are being reported every day in this month.
For the second day in a row, the district reported two deaths in a day, taking the death toll to 558. The total number of deaths reported in this month is 12. The active cases have increased to 2,440. With the recovery of 192 persons, the number of recoveries has increased to 61,867 in the district.
Special drive
The special drive by the police to keep a check on people violating COVID-19 norms by not wearing masks continues in the city. In a span of around two weeks, the police teams have imposed fines against more than 50,000 people at various places.
According to Police Commissioner Manish Kumar Sinha, the drive was initiated on March 27 with a two-fold strategy. “Our main aim was to create awareness over the increasing number of cases and need to wear face masks, maintain social distancing and using hand sanitisers. Meanwhile we also wanted to penalise those who violate the protocol by not wearing mask,” he said.
A large number of pedestrians and those travelling on bikes were told to use masks in public as a social responsibility. Mr. Sinha was seen distributing masks to a number of people on Beach Road on Saturday.
“Visakha Police will continue to pursue the mask enforcement drive in order to bring more awareness and compliance to the protocol and to ensure appropriate behaviour by public at large,” the CP added.
Since March 27, city police wing, including law and order, crime, traffic and AR force, has been conducting the drives and booking cases against people for not wearing masks. On an average, the police used to book about 2,000 to 6,000 per day. Till April 9, the police have booked 50,037 cases.
According to police officials, the fine (e-challan) for not wearing mask is about ₹100 and user charges is about ₹20. However number of motorists were found driving without helmet and some triple-riding. Combining all the violations, the fine amount generated is about ₹80 lakh.
