Guwahati Lockdown extended for another week. Check new guidelines here

Guwahati: Assam Chief Secretary Kumar Sanjay Krishna, after consulting with several stakeholders has decided to extend the lockdown in Guwahati by another week. The lockdown will now remain in force till 7 pm on July 19.

Announcing the lockdown, Sanjay Krishna wrote in the order, "It has been reported to me by District Magistrate, Kamrup Metropolitan that there is continuing large scale spread of COVID-19 occurring in almost the entire district of Kamrup (Metropolitan) which may be a major threat to public health, hygiene, and safety of the general population." Sanjay Krishna had earlier been intimated by the Himanta Biswa Sarma-led health department that one more week is required to bring the disease under control.

Earlier, senior government officials and representatives of many wards met to take a decision in regards to whether the lockdown in Guwahati should be extended. Various Nagrik Committees, Assam Police, and Kamrup Metro District Administration were also present. In the meeting, all the stakeholders came to the conclusion that a lockdown in an absolute must in order to mitigate the situation.

The new rules and guidelines for the new phase of lockdown are as under:

The death rate in Assam, has meanwhile, reached .23%. Although the rate has climbed in recent times, it pales in comparison to the 2.69% national average. Assam Finance and Health Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma today also announced that the recovery rate in the state has now reached 63.39%. "If we are to consider all the states in the country, we are ay number 5. If we are to exclude the smaller states, we are at number 4", said Sarma.

Despite admitting that the number of cases have increased, Sharma shared optimism by stating that the number of releases have also skyrocketed upwards. "If we are to look at it, we are between the 700-900 case range on a daily basis. He also added that the number of daily discharges is around the 450 case-mark.

The health minister also informed that the doubling rate has decreased to 11. "The doubling rate was 16 days back in 29 June, so this does not bode well for us", Sarma said, adding that in regards to the number of tests conducted per million, we have conducted 16,744 tests per million. 

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