LARKANA: As many as 24 persons out of 35 whose samples were collected a couple of days before tested positive for coronavirus on Saturday, raising the total number of cases to 144 in the district, said health officials.

The officials said that of the 24 new cases, 15 were related to a Covid-19 patient who died on April 28 in OPF Colony Larkana and nine lived in Larkana including four employees of Sukkur Electric Power Supply Company, said sources.

The 45-year-old man who died from the virus was assistant director in Sindh Building Control Authority and was later buried in Ratodero.

SUKKUR: Nineteen more people were found to have coronavirus infection in Jacobabad district, according to Deputy Commissioner Ghazanfar Ali Qadri.

He told media persons on Saturday that samples of 44 persons were sent to the Gambat Institute of Medical Sciences two days ago and of them 19 were found to have the virus including a doctor, six family members of a coronavirus-infected man, seven family members of another infected man and six employees of Kafalat Ehsaas centre.

He said that samples of more than 80 prisoners and jail staff were also taken for test at district jail in the wake of detection of virus in a prisoner and a policeman.

Meanwhile, three people tested positive for coronavirus in Karampur town of Kandhkot district.

A 43-year-old grain trader and his partner who had returned from Karachi a few days back and a young labourer who worked in Karachi and recently arrived in Karampur had tested positive for the virus.

The district administration and health department Kandhkot quarantined the infected persons in isolation centre in Karampur and collected samples of 15 members of their families for tests.

Kandhkot District Health Officer Dr Ahsan Dahani advised people who had come into contact with the infected persons to come forward voluntarily and have themselves tested so as to contain the spread of the virus.

SHIKARPUR: The testing centres for Covid-19 had been shut down for last two days due to large number of positive cases for virus which reached 49 in 48 hours on Saturday.

ADC-I Ali Raza Ansari said that 90 people tested positive for the virus out of 702 samples and 76 of them were cases of local transmission; only six were sent to quarantine centre in public school hostel.

General public was worried due to closure of the testing centre while health officials had allegedly collected samples of 15 influential persons at their homes and declared them all as negative, said sources.

Meanwhile, people at quarantine centre complained of unhygienic conditions at the centre in a video and appealed to authorities to provide them proper facilities.

Citizens complained that no arrangements had been made to supply food etc to the inmates and only five out of 76 positive cases were sent to quarantine centre which was quite unfair.

They demanded sending all virus-positive cases to isolation centre to save the lives of people who were forced to live with and near them.

Published in Dawn, May 3rd, 2020