Covid-19 Daily Update - May 10

54 new cases reported in Karnataka, the highest single-day spike so far. Indian Railways is set to resume partial passenger service from May 11th and Amulya looks at the effect of the pandemic in conflict-zones and war-torn areas.

The daily update with Akhil Kadidal.

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This the daily COVID-19 update from Deccan Herald.
On the bulletin today:
Karnataka reports the highest spike in new cases...54 cases have been recorded today. PM Modi will meet Chief Ministers tomorrow, Indian Railways has decided to resume passenger train services in a phased manner...
And we look at what the novel coronavirus is doing to war-torn areas or in conflict zones...
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But first... as we go into this recording..
More than 2000 new COVID-19 cases have been reported today

More than 43,000 people are active carriers of the virus.
Over 20,000 patients have recovered since they were first tested and...
The country has registered over 2000 COVID-related deaths so far.

India has readied more than 6.5 lakh beds at more than 7000 facilities across 483 districts to meet the challenge posed by the outbreak. With migrant workers returning to their home states in huge numbers, this infrastructure is likely to be put to test over the next few days.
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The Indian Council of Medical Research has tested more than 16 lakh samples so far, and more than 85,000 tests in the last 24 hours.
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A look at the numbers from some of the states…
Mumbai alone has reported 19 deaths today and Maharashtra continues to have the highest number of active cases in the country.
Tamil Nadu has added 669 cases and has over 5000 active cases. Gujarat has reported 399 new cases, which has taken its tally to 5157 active cases
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A look at the numbers from Karnataka...54 cases of COVID-19 have been reported in the state, this is the highest single day spike. Shivamogga which until now was a green zone has reported 8 new cases, all of whom have returned from Ahmedabad in Gujarat. District in-charge minister K S Eshwarappa has said that these are linked to the Tablighi Jamaat congregation held in Delhi. All the returnees have been quarantined.
22 new cases from Belagavi, 8 cases from Bagalkote and one case from Davangere, have a travel history to Ajmer in Rajasthan.
Since the relaxation of the lockdown on May 4th, 233 cases have been reported in the state. Compared to this, 102 cases had been recorded in the state, 6 days before the lockdown was announced. The spike has also been triggered by people returning to Karnataka from other states.
Among other cases, 7 cases linked to Patient 659 are reported from Bhatkal.

Kalaburagi has reported 4 new cases, of which one has presented with Severe Acute Respiratory Illness, one with Influenza-Like-Illness. One has a travel history to Maharashtra and one is a contact of a previously diagnosed patient.
Bengaluru urban has reported one case from Padarayanapura, and two cases have presented with SARI and ILI.

One case from Chikkaballapura is a contact of a previously diagnosed patient.
With this, the state has reported a total of 848 cases out of which 394 are active cases. 422 patients have been discharged so far and 31 deaths have occurred in the state
A 56-year-old woman from Bengaluru is the most recent casualty due to the viral infection. The woman had complained of breathlessness and had sought treatment at two private hospitals, neither of whom had run a test for Covid-19. A postmortem test confirmed the presence of the virus..
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In national news,
Prime Minister Narendra Modi will meet Chief Ministers from various states
via video conferencing tomorrow, to decide on the future course of action. The third phase of the lockdown ends in a week.
After 54 days of lockdown, opinion among the Chief Ministers is divided.
Some like Telangana want the lockdown extended until May 29, Maharashtra is inclined to favour this.
However some others have resigned to the fact that this virus will remain in our midst, and that livelihoods must not be lost as a consequence.
Some states are favouring a zone wise lockdown instead of locking out the entire state. Migrant movement has come out to be a huge issue in the Lockdown 3.0. The Karnataka government has written to the Centre to allow a zonal classification of Bengaluru city, to enable economic activity.
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The Indian Railways plans to resume passenger service from May 12th but in a phased manner. All trains will originate from New Delhi and travel to 15 locations across the country including Mumbai, Bengaluru and Chennai. As of now, only online booking is permitted on the IRCTC website from 4pm on May 11th, booking counters will stay closed. Only those with confirmed tickets will be allowed to enter railway stations. For details, log on to the deccanherald website.

Indian Railways to
resume service:
May 12th
New Delhi to
Dibrugarh, Agartala, Howrah,
Patna, Bilaspur, Ranchi,
Bhubaneswar, Secunderabad,
Bengaluru, Chennai, Thiruvananthapuram,
Madgaon, Mumbai Central,
Ahmedabad and Jammu Tawi.
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Days, after 11 lives were lost to a gas leak in a factory in Visakhapatnam, the National Disaster Management Authority, has issued fresh guidelines for factories reopening during and after the Covid-19 lockdown, advising them not to scale up production in the first week itself and instead run on a trial basis.
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In news from Karnataka...Yene-poya Medical College Hospital in Dakshina Kannada district has received a nod from Indian Council of Medical Research to conduct tests for Covid-19. Yene-poya Hospital is the first private hospital in Dakshina Kannada district to get ICMR approval for COVID-19 RT-PCR tests.
Of the 35 ICMR approved labs in Karnataka, 28 have been running tests. Of these 17 are government facilities and 11 are private labs.
Despite the demand for private labs, data released today reveals that they account for just 7.9% of all samples tested in the state. Government labs have tested more than 92,000 samples
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Moving on, it goes without saying that the Covid-19 pandemic is unlike anything we’ve seen so far. The first pandemic of the century, it has changed our notion of the enemy - with many calling the virus, the invisible enemy. But there are several locations around the world dealing with both an external enemy as well as Covid-19.
In our international segment, Amulya takes a look at how conflict zones and war-ridden countries are dealing with the health crisis… on top of everything else that they have to deal with. Amulya.

One of the major things that this pandemic has demonstrated is no matter which country you may belong to, the novel coronavirus will get to you. If not now, eventually.
When developed countries with stable economies are finding it difficult to control COVID-19, what about the conflict zones? What about the refugees? How are those living within these fragile nation-states faring?

According to the Associated Press, there are over 7 crore people worldwide who have been driven from their homes by war and unrest, up to 1 crore people are packed into refugee camps and informal settlements, and almost none have been tested for the coronavirus.

In the last 24 hours , Bangladesh rescued around 280 Rohingya refugees stranded at sea, who HAVE NOW BEEN PLACED UNDER quarantine in the country.
The authorities have towed their boat to the Bhasan Char island in Bay of Bengal. Last weekend, 29 Rohingyas were taken to the same island. The country has faced severe criticism from human rights activists and Rohingya leaders for choosing this island for resettlement of the refugees, as it is vulnerable to floods and elephant attacks. It may EVEN GO UNDERWATER by next monsoon
The Bangladesh government has not yet decided what it’s going to do once the 14-day quarantine period ends. Despite the coronavirus scare, boats filled with Rohingyas continue to be found in the waters.

Their hopes of reaching Malaysia or Thailand are now dashed, as almost all South-east asian countries have tightened patrolling of their borders to protect themselves from the novel coronavirus and are not heeding the UN, which has urged the countries to let at least the boats land.
In Syria, it has been almost a decade since the conflict began and now the country is being governed by three different entities. Right now, there are around 50 reported cases of covid-19 and 3 deaths across fragmented Syria.

In the rebel-held northwestern Idlib province with more than 4 million population, there are just 98 ventilators. According to AP, The World Health Organization has sent 5,900 testing kits to Idlib, where they are being carefully rationed. Authorities have carried out around 200 tests so far, all of which came back negative.
According to an Al-Jazeera report, medical personnel in Kurdish-run northeast Syria are making protective gear from rubbish bags.
This territory has been cut off from outside aid, including United Nations shipments from Iraq that were vetoed by Syrian government’s ally Russia. Since Syrian authorities have conducted coronavirus tests only in Damascus's central lab, Kurdish-run north east had to send its samples by plane to the capital.

Meanwhile, since most of the major cities, including Damascus is under Syrian government’s control, WHO has mainly depended on Assad’s regime to supply the medical necessities. But the regime is not sending it out of non-government areas like Kurdish north-east and rebel-held northwest, where WHO has had to engage in separate negotiations

In Yemen, a country which is going through a worst humanitarian crisis with ongoing famine, cholera outbreaks and Saudi-led military blockade, a total 36 positive cases of COVID-19 have been reported.
The nation was under heavy bombing by Saudi Arabia until recently, before announcing a unilateral ceasefire on April 9, to contain the virus. COVID-19 can be especially devastating to the malnourished population of Yemanis as WHO believes the population has some of the lowest levels of immunity to the disease compared with other countries. Around 80% of the population depends on the humanitarian aid in Yemen.
In Kashmir, the Indian government cut all communication and internet services in the wake of Hizbul Mujahideen commander Riyaz Naikoo’s killing. But, mobile phone service was restored on Saturday. The government has ramped up counterinsurgency operations in the valley while the rest of the country deals with the pandemic.
Similarly many conflict zones across the globe like Libya, Somalia, Eastern Ukraine, may have to be ready for some upheaval - not only in terms of public health, but also politically, as different state and non-state actors try to consolidate power during this pandemic.
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For the latest updates, log on to deccanherald.com.