The villages of Ponnala and Boath in Telangana’s Adilabad district imposed a self-lockdown on Thursday, in view of the rising COVID-19 cases. As part of this lockdown, the villagers have passed a resolution to close all the commercial establishments, including retail stores, after 5 pm. This lockdown will continue for another 10 days, authorities said. The decision was taken after both villages recorded 20 cases in the last week.
“Only emergency services like medical stores are kept open,” said Adilabad District Medical Health Officer (DMHO) Todasam Chandu.
The DMHO said that several other villages in the district are following suit. District authorities held a discussion with the Chamber of Commerce to encourage a self-imposed lockdown, and thereby reduce the spread of the virus. “Many more villages will take such a decision after the Ugadi festival,” the DMHO added.
In the last seven days, Adilabad has recorded 275 COVID-19 cases. The district witnessed a spike this week when daily cases rose from 24 on Wednesday to 72 and 70 on Friday and Saturday respectively.
Since Adilabad district borders Maharashtra, which has been recording around 60,000 cases per day, authorities are maintaining vigil.
The trend of self-imposed lockdowns has been noticed in the districts of Jagtial and Jayashankar Bhupalapally. The gram panchayat of Sirpur village in Mallapur mandal, Jagtial, reportedly self-declared a lockdown till 15 April after 27 people tested positive for the virus in a single day. Similarly, the villages of Garmillapalle and Edapally have imposed a lockdown after several people contracted the virus as a result of a super-spreader event. In Edapally, 49 people tested positive for the virus when they reportedly participated in a jathara (carnival). Edapally is located near the Maharashtra border and many of them are believed to have participated in the religious gathering.
In view of the rising cases, Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao has issued directions to medical authorities to set up testing centres in Gadwal, Wanaparthy, Khammam, Nirmal, Mancherial, Kamareddy, Sangareddy, Medak, Jagtial, Peddapalli, Ramagundam, Bhongir, Jangaon and Vikarabad districts. Hospitals in districts bordering Maharashtra have been fully equipped to handle the crisis.
Meanwhile, on Saturday, the state has recorded 2,909 COVID-19 cases and six deaths. Presently, the state has 17,791 active cases.
(The article was originally published in The News Minute and has been reposted with permission.)
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