Shillong, June 10: Chief Minister Conrad Sangma has expressed concern over epicentre of Covid moving towards rural areas.
The chief minister told reporters on Thursday that as there are more cases in Jaintia Hills, he will visit Jowai on Friday to take stock of the situation.
He said the spread is taking place throughout the state but the epicentre is shifting slowly from Shillong and East Khasi Hills as the spread is happening in other districts as well.
The chief minister said the highly contagious Delta variant of Covid-19 found in the state may be responsible for the sudden surge in the number of cases in the rural areas of the state.
“After doing the genome sequence of large numbers of samples, we are seeing that this is more of a Delta variant that we have which is a very highly infectious and high transmissible variant,” Sangma said.
He said West Garo Hills and West Jaintia Hills have touched about 70-80 cases on an average in the last few days. “Now, we are seeing Shillong and East Khasi Hills having about 200 plus average cases in a day,” he said.
More new cases than recoveries
Stating that the state is seeing more new cases than the recoveries during the past 24 hours, the chief minister said the government will observe the situation in the next few days and make sure that the rural areas and rural infrastructures are also equally prepared for the situation.
While 603 new cases were reported in the state in the last 24 hours, the recoveries were only 427. The number of persons died was 10 with East Khasi Hills registering 6 followed by two each in East Jaintia Hills and West Jaintia Hills.
When asked about the reason for the spread in rural areas of East Khasi Hills despite containment measures, the chief minister said after containment measures in East Khasi Hills, the results indicate that the numbers are going down. “Definitely, rural areas are quite vulnerable and open. People are moving and the fact that the Delta variant is also an infectious one adds to such a situation,” he said.
To a question, the chief minister said the government will decide on Friday whether to continue with the lockdown measures after seeing the trend and reports from the deputy commissioners.
