Pune district reported a record surge of 200 new COVID-19 cases on Thursday, taking the tally of active positive cases to 1,441, while five more deaths took the casualty toll to 90.
“As many as 87 new cases were reported between 9 p.m. on Wednesday and midnight, while a further 113 have been reported till Thursday evening,” District Health Officer Bhagwan Pawar said. Till date, the district has reported 1,738 positive cases, including 1,546 cases in Pune city and 113 in Pimpri-Chinchwad.
“The 1,738 include the number of active positive cases still undergoing treatment in hospitals, along with 305 people discharged, and the 90 deaths. As many as 76 of the active cases are in a ‘critical’ condition,” Pune Divisional Commissioner Deepak Mhaisekar told The Hindu .
The district, which comprises Pune city, Pune rural, and Pimpri-Chinchwad, has witnessed a surge of more than 350 new coronavirus cases since Monday this week.
“We still have to ascertain the cause of this fresh surge. On Tuesday, the district reported 143 new cases but they were consolidated reports of samples taken previously. The fresh cases are generally coming from the same ‘highly-infected’ clusters,” Mr. Mhaisekar said.
He further said the Pune civic body was concentrating on the five most infected wards in the city and taking samples from these areas in a focussed manner.
Commenting on the cases in Pune division — which consists of the districts of Satara, Sangli, Kolhapur and Solapur along with Pune — Mr. Mhaisekar said 1,905 cases had been recorded this far, of which 1,504 cases were active. “Till date, the division has reported 99 deaths. Apart from the 90 from Pune, Satara has recorded two deaths, Solapur has reported six, and Sangli has recorded one,” Mr. Mhaisekar said.
In terms of cases, he said, Satara district had recorded 43 positive cases, of which 33 were active, while Solapur had reported 81, of which 75 were active cases. “Sangli has recorded 30 cases, of which only three are active and Kolhapur has reported 13 positive cases, of which 10 are active.”
As many as 86 of the 90 deaths have been reported from Pune city and rural areas, and three from Pimpri-Chinchwad.
Meanwhile, Malegaon in Nashik district, which has emerged as a hotspot in north Maharashtra, has reported more than 50 new cases since Wednesday.
While the rest of the district has only 16 active positive cases, Malegaon’s tally of active positive cases has surged to 235, with 12 people succumbing to the contagion. Till date, Nashik has recorded 276 COVID-19 cases, which include 12 deaths, all from Malegaon.
