New Delhi, May 13 (IANS): The Union Health Ministry Wednesday said the Nanded Hazur Sahib returnees in Punjab constituted the bulk of cases with 1,225 positive among the total of 4,216 while the doubling time for new cases has improved to 12.6 in the last three days in the country.

Harsh Vardhan, Union Minister of Health and Family Welfare urged Punjab government to further strengthen SARI/ILI screening, in addition to ensuring that non-COVID health issues such as immunisation drives, TB case finding and treatment, providing blood transfusion for dialysis patients, treatment of cancer patients, ANC of pregnant women, etc, are not adversely affected.

"As the available data indicate a decline in the notification of TB cases in the private and public clinics, the state needs to give priority to this area too," said Vardhan.

Vardhan held a high level meeting through a video conference with Balbir Singh Sidhu, Health Minister of Punjab. This is a part of a series of one-to-one discussions with various states/UTs Health Ministers and Collectors of Red Zone and High priority districts to take stock of preparedness. According to the health ministry, as on May 12, "all 22 districts stand affected by COVID-19 with a total 1913 cases; 3 districts (Ludhiana, Jalandhar and Patiala) are in the Red Zone and 15 are in the Orange Zone. The total samples collected are 43,999 with sample positivity rate at 4.3 per cent. The Nanded Hazoor Sahib returnees constituted the bulk of cases with 1,225 positive among the total of 4,216."

The state government said that it has another big challenge at hand with the number of migrant labour returning being around 20,521.

A total of 74,281 cases have been reported where 24,386 persons have been cured and 2,415 deaths have been reported so far. "In the last 24 hours, 3,525 new confirmed cases have been added. While the doubling time in the past 14 days was 11, it has improved to 12.6 in the last three days," it noted. It added that the fatality rate is 3.2 per cent and the recovery rate is pegged at 32.8 per cent ", said the health ministry.

Cumulatively, 18,56,477 tests have been done so far for COVID-19, whereas, 94,708 samples were tested on Tuesday. "Today, there are nine states/UTs that have not reported any cases of COVID-19 in the last 24 hours. A&N Islands, Arunachal Pradesh, Dadra & Nagar Haveli, Goa, Chhattisgarh, Ladakh, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram. Also, Daman & Diu, Sikkim, Nagaland and Lakshadweep have not reported any cases till", said Vardhan.