COVID-19: Odisha declares more areas as containment zones

With fresh COVID-19 cases reported in hitherto untouched regions of Odisha, the state government on Sunday declared more areas as containment zones to check the spread of the disease, officials said. The administration will conduct surveillance on residents of the areas and trace the persons with whom four new COVID-19 patients had come in contact with, they said.

All the four new patients have travel history, with one of them having attended the Tablighi Jamaat congregation in Delhi's Nizamuddin area, the officials said. With four fresh cases reported in the last 24 hours, the total count in Odisha now stands at 54.

The disease has now spread to tribal-dominated Sundargarh district with two of the four new COVID-19 patients hailing from there, taking the total number of affected districts to nine, they said. One of the two COVID-19 patients from the district is a 67-year-old man from Bisra area who had attended the Tablighi Jamaat congregation in the national capital, an official said.

The other COVID-19 patient is also from the same area. The 18-year-old youth had come in contact with the Tablighi Jamaat congregation attendee, he said. The other two new COVID-19 patients are a 17-year-old girl from Rajnagar area in Kendrapara district who had returned home from Kolkata on March 29 and a 46-year-old man from Jharpada area in Bhubaneswar who is a relative of a person who had died of coronavirus infection, the official said.

Following two persons getting afflicted with the disease in Bisra area, the Sundargarh district administration has declared a three-km radius around Bisra Sadar as a containment zone, Collector Nikhil Pavan Kalyan said. The area has been sealed preventing any movement into or out of the locality. The containment will continue for the next 48 hours. All the essential commodities will be delivered at the doorsteps of the residents as they are not allowed to venture out of their houses, he said.

"We have started location mapping of the patients to find out the persons they had come in contact with. Swab samples of all such persons will be tested," the collector said. The area is being sanitised and movement of public and private transport has been prohibited. All residents have been instructed to stay indoors. There are over 1,500 families in the area, he said.

Similar measures have been taken in parts of Rajnagar area in Kendrapara district from where the 17-year-old COVID- 19 patient hails, officials said. Some villages in the area with 150 households have been sealed for the conduct of contact tracing and surveillance, Kendrapada district Collector Samarth Verma said.

Swab samples of the COVID-19 patient's family members have been collected for examination, he said, adding that samples of all persons who came in contact with her will also be tested.

Six localities in Bhubaneswar comprising 7,992 households have already been sealed and declared containment zones. Surveillance is being conducted on around 4,000 people and samples of some persons suspected to be infected with the disease have been sent for examination, officials said.

Surya Nagar, Bomikhal, Satya Nagar, Sunarpada, Kapila Prasad and IB Colony areas in Bhubaneswar have been declared as containment zones. There are three containment zones in Cuttack district and one each in Puri, Ganjam, Jajpur, Kendrapara, Bhadrak and Kalahandi districts.