Thane, Jun 27 (PTI) A Central team on Saturday visited Thane district to review the COVID-19 situation and told local authorities to concentrate on reducing the mortality rate from the infection.

As on Friday night, Thane district had 27,479 COVID-19 cases, with Thane city, Kalyan-Dombivali and Bhiwandi numbers being particularly worrisome, while 911 people have succumbed to the infection.

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The team, which included Joint Secretary in the Union Health Ministry Lav Agarwal, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Housing and Civil Affairs Kunal Kumar among others, met local officials led by Thane civic chief Vipin Sharma.

The team visited restricted quarantine areas in Amritnagar, Inshanagar in Mumbra as well as a COVID-19 facility set up at Maulana Azad Stadium and COVID hospital in Balkum Saket.

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Agarwal said the emphasis should be on reducing the mortality rate and suggested testing capacity be increased in the district.

Pradip Vyas, principal secretary (health) in the state government said the need of the hour was large-scale contact tracing, increasing the number of tests and setting up of more quarantine facilities.

(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)