West Bengal on Thursday reported 435 new patients who tested positive for Covid-19, while 12 more people died of the disease. The total number of coronavirus cases that have been reported from Bengal stand at 12,735 and the death toll is at 518.
However the number of active cases reduced because of high number of recoveries and it now stands at 5,216. So far 7,001 patients have been discharged from hospitals across the state after recovery.
Even as Bengal worked to bring down Covid-19 numbers, a market in Burdwan was shut down after the virus spread from there. A protest by fishermen in Purba Medinipur’s Petuaghat Fishing Harbour flouted social distancing norms.
The West Bengal government has meanwhile directed private hospitals to refrain from charging extra costs from Covid patients.
Here are the updates from today:
Station Bazar in Durgapur shutdown
The Station Bazar in Durgapur in the West Burdwan district was shut down after the owner of a garment store and five members of his family tested positive for Covid-19.
The Telegraph reported that 30 employees of the shop who came in contact with the owner and his son, have undergone tests and have been asked to quarantine at home.
The report said the man had visited Gujarat and the market was shut down a week after he tested positive.
Fisherman’s protest led by TMC flouts social distancing norms
A fisherman’s protest in Purba Medinipur’s Petuaghat Fishing Harbour flouted social distancing norms on Thursday and the rally is said to have been led by a group of 100 TMC leaders.
The Telegraph reported that over 5,000 fishermen protested over postponement of fishing from June 15 to 30.
Sanatan Das, a fisherman, told the newspaper, “We are dying from lack of food so we care little about social distancing. We are here to protest that local rowdies are not allowing us to resume our livelihood.”
The report said that the venue of the protest also had large posters of chief minister Mamata Banerjee.
Govt direction to hospital
The Mamata Banerjee government on Thursday asked private hospitals to not burden its patients with extra costs during treatment in the current economic slowdown.
PTI quoted chief secretary Rajiva Sinha as saying, “We have information that if seven doctors attend a patient, the cost of PPEs of all of them is paid by the patient. This is not right. You cannot put all the cost on patients. The hospital should bear a part of it and the patient should be asked to bear only a small part of it. Because of the economic slowdown, everybody is facing problems.”
The chief secretary was talking to reporters after holding a meeting with representatives of private hospitals.
Sinha that the government may fix a rate, if this was not rationalised.
There are discrepancies in prices charged by private laboratories for COVID-19 tests and that has to be rationalized, he said adding that one lab is charging Rs 2,800 while another is doing it for Rs 4,500, Sinha said.
“We have urged them to reduce the charges for conducting (COVID-19) tests. We have not fixed anything (till now). But we will decide on it if we find that problems are arising. We are keeping a watch on it,” PTI quoted him as saying.
(With PTI inputs)
For the latest news and more, follow HuffPost India on Twitter, Facebook, and subscribe to our newsletter.