6 more people die due to COVID-19 in West Bengal; 183 fresh cases take tally to 4,192

Six more people died due to COVID-19 in West Bengal on Wednesday, taking the coronavirus toll to 217 as 183 fresh cases surfaced in the state, according to a medical bulletin. With these new cases, the total number of COVID-19 infections in the state has reached 4,192, it said. At present, there are 2,325 active cases in West Bengal.

Five fatalities were reported from Kolkata, while one was reported from North 24 Parganas district, the bulletin said. Of the 183 new cases, 57 were reported from Kolkata, 36 from North 24 Parganas district, 23 from Howrah, 19 from South 24 Parganas and 12 from Bankura, among others.

The 12 COVID-19 patients from Bankura are migrant workers who have recently returned to the state from Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu, district health officials said, adding that they are undergoing treatment at a designated hospital in Durgapur. In the last 24 hours, 9,236 samples have been tested for COVID-19, it said, adding that the state has so far tested a total of 1,66,513 samples.

A senior officer at Beliaghata police station tested positive for COVID-19, following which a few other policemen posted there were put under home quarantine, health department sources said. A bank official from the city has also tested positive for the disease, they added. Earlier, the state government had attributed the death of 72 coronavirus patients to comorbidities and said COVID-19 in those cases was "incidental".