India News | 27 New Cases Take COVID-19 Tally of Andamans to 5,289

Port Blair, Apr 17 (PTI) Months after keeping the COVID-19 outbreak in check, Andaman and Nicobar Islands along with the entire country have started experiencing the second wave of coronavirus infections with 27 more people testing positive for the disease, which took the tally in the Union Territory to 5,289, an official said Saturday.

Seven new patients have travel history and twenty were detected during contact tracing, he said.

The death toll remained at 63 as no fresh fatality due to the infection was reported in the last 24 hours, he said.

At least 28 people were cured of the disease during the period, taking the total number of recoveries in the archipelago to 5,110.

The Union Territory now has 116 active cases.

The local administration has been strict to contain the spread of the disease and has adopted an approach of tracking, testing and treating, the official said.

"People arriving here from mainland are mandatorily required to undergo rapid antigen test.

"Arrangements have been made to quarantine coronavirus-positive passengers at government-run facilities. If a traveller is diagnosed with the disease, he or she can also stay at identified hotels on a payment basis," he said.

Altogether, 13,219 health and frontline workers have been inoculated, while 53,284 people above 45 years of age received the vaccine shots.

The Andaman and Nicobar administration has conducted 3,47,489 sample tests for COVID-19 so far, and the positivity rate stands at 1.52 per cent.

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)