Thursday 28 March 2024
 
»
 
»
Story

India extends lockdown by another 2 weeks in Covid fight

NEW DELHI, May 1, 2020

India on Friday extended the nationwide lockdown put in to contain the coronavirus outbreak, by another two weeks, said media reports.
 
This is in addition to the extended lockdown due to end on May 4 as announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. It was set to end this Sunday but now it has been pushed to May 17. 
 
"After a comprehensive review, and in view of the lockdown measures having led to significant gains in the Covid-19 situation in the country, Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA), Government of India (GoI) issued an Order under the Disaster Management Act, 2005, today, to further extend the lockdown for a further period of two weeks beyond May 4, 2020," said a home ministry notification.
 
The extension will however see some relaxations which will be regulated based on the spread of the virus in the districts, identified as red (hotspot), green and orange zones.
 
The green zones are districts with either zero confirmed cases till date; or, no confirmed case in the last 21 days. 
 
The classification of districts as red zones will take into account the total number of active cases, doubling rate of confirmed cases, extent of testing and surveillance feedback from the districts. Those districts, which are neither defined as Red nor Green, shall be classified as Orange zones.
 
The directives mentioned in the order will come into effect on May 4 onwards.
 
The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare meanwhile declared that India’s Covid-19 cases had touched 35,365 of whom 9,065 patients had recovered. There have been 1,152 deaths, leaving behind the number of active cases at 25,148.
 
This came even as Indian Railways announced that it will run "Shramik Special" trains from "Labour Day" to move migrant workers, pilgrims, tourists, students and other persons stranded at different places due to the nationwide lockdown that came into force from March 25, reported PTI. 
 
Six "Shramik Special" trains -- Lingampally to Hatia, Nasik to Lucknow, Aluva to Bhubaneswar, Nasik to Bhopal, Jaipur to Patna and Kota to Hatia, will be run for these labourers.
 
These special trains will be run from point to point on the request of both the state governments concerned as per the standard protocols for sending and receiving such stranded persons. 
 
The railways and state governments shall appoint senior officials as nodal officers for coordination and a smooth operation of these 'Shramik Specials'," said the report.
 
The railways operated the first such train with 1,200 passengers from Hyderabad to Jharkhand early morning at 4:50 am today.
 
As per the new MHA directive, the coming week will see intensified surveillance protocols, contact tracing and 100% coverage of Aarogya Setu app.
 
Some activities will remain prohibited despite the classification of red, orange and green zones. These include travel by air, rail, metro and inter-state movement by road. Schools, colleges, training/coaching centres and other educational institutions will also remain closed.
 
Hotels, restaurants, cinema halls, malls and gyms will also continue to remain closed apart from places of worship, it stated.
 
Containment zones will see house to house surveillance, home/ institutional quarantining of affected, and clinical management. Strict perimeter will be ensured, it added.



Tags:

More INTERNATIONAL NEWS Stories

calendarCalendar of Events

Ads