UP Covid tally doubles in 19 days, crosses 20,000

Lucknow: The novel coronavirus infection tally of Uttar Pradesh crossed the 20,000-mark on Thursday with addition of 654 cases in 24 hours. The number of cases rose from 10,186 on June 6 to 20,418 on June 25 -- the jump of 10,232 in 19 days.

Gautam Budh Nagar accounted for maximum of 143 fresh cases followed by Ghaziabad where 84 new cases were reported.

With these new cases, the tally for Ghaziabad reached 1,168 and it became the second most infected district in the state, replacing Agra, which has 1,164 cases.

Four of the top five districts in UP now have more than 1,000 cases. While Kanpur is at the fourth spot with 1,045 cases, the fifth spot goes to Meerut which is not far beyond with 900-plus cases.

As many as 15 persons died of the infection in 24 hours, taking the toll to 611. Death of two persons each was reported in Kanpur Nagar, Farrukhabad and Etawah, while Gautam Budh Nagar, Lucknow, Varanasi, Jaunpur, Azamgarh, Prayagraj, Bareilly, Mainpuri and Lalitpur recorded one death each.

Additional chief secretary, information and home department, Awanish Awasthi stated that the number of tests conducted in the state touched 6,20,954 mark with 16,521 cases in 24 hours. He said that surveillance activities were being intensified in the state. “Asha workers have screened over 18 lakh migrant workers in the state of whom 1,219 showed flu like symptoms. Upon testing, 17% (or 217) of the symptomatic migrants tested positive,” he said.

Other districts with double digit entries included Lucknow (34), Meerut (33), Budaun (23), Kanpur Nagar (22), Gorakhpur (22), Firozabad (21), Bijnore (18), Ayodhya (17), Aligarh (16), Jhansi (12), Rampur (11), Prayagraj (11), Sambhal (11) and Shahjahanpur (11).