After recording 695 cases on Wednesday, the district recorded 823 new cases in the last 24 hours ending Thursday morning. The spurt in cases in the last one week has taken the total case load to 1,62,296, with about 3,000 cases coming up in the last 15 days.
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The active cases have also jumped from 121 as on December 27 to 2,746, as on Friday.
No deaths were recorded during the last 24 hours and the count stands at 1,112.
Meanwhile, 44 person were earlier infected with the virus have been discharged or declared as recovered, taking the total recoveries to 1,58,434.
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Drop in vaccination
Meanwhile with the Sankranti festival fever picking up, people walking up to the vaccination centre has seen a good drop on Friday. “We hope that it will pick up after the festival and holidays,” said. Jeevan Rani, District Immunisation Officer. “But we will remain open through out the festival,” she added.
On Friday, a few PHCs (public health centres) such as the one in Chinnawaltair and MVP were seen closed. There is an apprehension that the staff manning the centres might have contracted the virus. However, the Health Department in the district was unable to give any clarity on the issue.
However, Dr. Jeevan Rani said that the booster jab for the frontline workers, including the health staff, is on course and about 7,000 health workers out of a total of around 25,000 have been given the booster jab.
Vaccination drive for the police force is on course and about 1,250 personnel from the District Police have been administered the booster dose, which is close to 50% of the total force strength.
Speaking about the effect of third wave on the police force, Superintendent of Police, Visakhapatnam, B. Krishna Rao, said that so far about 30 have tested positive, but fortunately all the cases were mild and there was no need for any hospitalisation.
The COVID centre has been activated and all machinery is in place, he said.
During the first wave about 400 from the district police were infected and four had lost their lives. In the second wave, close to 300 were affected and there were three deaths.