With 2,100 Covid-19 Cases, Pune's Pimpri-Chinchwad Sees Record 700% Spike in Infections in One Month

The number of coronavirus infections in Pune's Pimpri-Chinchwad surpassed the 2,000-mark on Tuesday. Notably, this had been estimated by the civic body at the beginning of June, The Indian Express reported.

Municipal Commissioner Shravan Hardikar told the publication that he had made the prediction that coronavirus cases would increase to between 2,000 and 3,000 during a civic general body meeting.

Pimpri-Chinchwad was designated a non-Red Zone area a month ago and it has since witnessed a surge in Covid-19 cases. In a steep increase of more than 700 per cent in a month, the cases climbed from 274 on May 22, to 2,100 as of now.

But the municipal commissioner does not attribute the rise in the caseload to the “unlocking” of the city. He said that a vital factor was the ramping up of testing capacity and added that they were experiencing a few infrastructure issues which have been resolved now, resulting in more people getting tested.

"After the continued rise in cases by month-end, the number will start coming down as we will test more people and quarantine them...," Hardikar was quoted as saying.

He noted that out of the over 2,000 cases reported, close to 1,300 infections were from slums and chawls. Hardikar said that owing to the high population density and congested conditions in slums, social distancing measures are not strictly practised, resulting in an increase in the number of cases.

Hardikar said that many cases had also surfaced from containment zones and added that as of now, there are 150 containment zones.

He remarked that despite removing 110 containment zones, more keep cropping up.

He, however, assured that with the heightened testing, isolation of the infected and awareness drives, there would be a fall in the cases.

In Pimpri-Chinchwad, 60 Covid-19 patients have succumbed to the viral infection. Out of these, 35 were reported from Pimpri-Chinchwad and the remaining 25 from areas beyond the city limits.

Meanwhile, Pune city recorded 501 new Covid-19 cases in the last 24 hours, taking its count to 13,654, a health official said on Wednesday.

The city's death toll due to the virus reached 545 with 17 succumbing to the infection, he said. But 155 patients were also discharged from the hospitals, the official added.

Maharashtra recorded as many as 208 coronavirus deaths, taking the state's fatality count to 6,739, a health department official said on Wednesday. As many as 3,890 new Covid-19 cases were registered in Maharashtra on Wednesday, taking the count of those infected to 1,42,900, the official added.