India News | COVID-19 Claims 62 More Lives in Bihar, Death Toll Reaches 3,139

Patna, May 7 (PTI) COVID-19 death toll in Bihar on Friday rose to 3,139, a rise of 62 since the previous day, even as 13,466 fresh cases caused the overall tally to reach 5.67 lakh while the active caseload stood at 1.15 lakh.

According to the state health department, Patna district reported the maximum number of 2,410 cases, a day after having witnessed its biggest single-day spike of 3,665 cases. It also accounted for 19 of the fresh fatalities, the highest for any of the 40 districts across the state.

The state has been rattled by an explosive rise in fresh incidences, attributed to the second wave, which has caused its total number of cases and death toll to more than double in about a month while there have been a more than 50 times rise in the active caseload during the same period.

As many as 13,489 coronavirus patients have recuperated from the infection in the last 24 hours, taking the total number of recoveries in the state to 44,9063.

The grim situation has also caused the recovery rate to plummet from over 98 per cent to just 79.16 per cent.

A complete lockdown, effective from May 5 to May 10, has been clamped to bring the situation under the control after measures like night curfew and restricting business hours for commercial establishments did not yield satisfactory results.

Besides the health infrastructure which is in dire straits, Bihar is also plagued by the problem of black- marketing of oxygen cylinders, much in demand since the recent spike.

The Patna High Court has, in an order passed on Thursday, asked the Nitish Kumar government to file a detailed affidavit by May 10 about "availability of medicines, black- marketing as also the availability of oxygen cylinders..... in district hospitals".

"The state must also ensure early vaccination of the age group 18-45 years as it is a large chunk of the population and its death rate has also been reported, in newspapers, to be high", the court had added.

Altogether 78.51 lakh people have been vaccinated so far in the state which has a total population of over 10 crores.

A majority of those who have received the jabs include those above 45 years of age besides frontline workers, including journalists, and those involved in the health care sector.

(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)