Ongoing lockdown in Karnataka may have to be extended beyond June 7, say experts

New Delhi/ Bengaluru: The Centre has extended the nationwide COVID-19 restrictions, which were put in place after its Apr. 29 order, till June 30. The Home Ministry said that even though the number of cases is declining, restrictions are necessary to put a check on the spread of the disease.

Home Secretary Ajay Bhalla has written to all States and UTs asking them to maintain strict rules in implementing containment and other measures in view of the declining trend in the number of new and active-daily cases.

“The strict implementation of containment and other measures has led to a declining trend in the number of new and active cases, across States and UTs, barring some areas in the Southern and North-Eastern regions,” the letter said.

“I would like to highlight that in spite of the declining trend, the number of active cases presently is still very high. It is, therefore, important that containment measures may continue to be implemented strictly. Any relaxation may be considered at an appropriate time, in a graded manner, after assessing the local situation, requirements and resources,” the order further said.

In the Apr. 29 order, the MHA directed the States to go for intensive and local containment measures in districts with a high number of cases to check the spread of the viral disease. It asked them to identify the districts where positivity rate was more than 10 percent in the last one week.

The MHA also asked the States to consider the containment measures, as conveyed in an advisory issued by the Union Health Ministry for immediate implementation based on an assessment of the situation. The Health Ministry said that the second wave is on the “downswing” in the country. It, however, highlighted that the current number of active cases is “still very high”.

Karnataka scenario

If the number of active Coronavirus cases does not drop, the ongoing lockdown in Karnataka may have to be extended beyond June 7 experts said.

The number of active COVID-19 cases crossed 4 lakh mark and the total number of infections crossed the 25 lakh mark, as the State recorded 24,214 new cases and 476 fatalities in the last 24 hours. While the positivity rate stood at 17.59 percent, the Case Fatality Rate (CFR) was at 1.96 percent. 

Elaborating on the situation, Prof. Sashikumar Ganesan, Chairman, Department of Computational and Data Sciences at the Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru, asserted that the number of active cases today is much higher than the number of cases they had estimated in the worst scenario, that is no lockdown.

“The numbers suggest that something has gone wrong with the lockdown and consequently the Government should not think of lifting the restrictions. The next three to four days are crucial to making this determination,” he said.