Bihar COVID19 restrictions as cases explodes: Shops to close at 4pm, night curfew imposed, details here

Patna, Apr 28: In view of the rising number of COVID-19 cases, the Bihar government on Wednesday announced new COVID-19 restrictions from April 29.

As per the new guidelines, it has been ordered that shops/commercial establishments will close at 4 pm daily while the timing of the night curfew will now be from 6 pm to 6 am. However, essential services will be allowed to operate.

According to the guidelines, only 50 people have been allowed in a wedding ceremony whereas only 20 people will be allowed to assemble for the last rites of individuals.

Bihar gasped with an active caseload that sniffed at the six-digit mark on Wednesday when a jittery state government also came out with more stringent restrictions in a desperate bid to contain the contagion that has been spreading at an alarming rate.

According to the state health departments bulletin, the number of active cases now stood at 98,747, a nearly 50 times increase since the beginning of the month when the active caseload was less than 2,000.

The severity of the outbreak of the second wave which has been blamed on new, mutant strains which are said to be much more contagious and lethal can also be gauged from the fact that the active caseload happens to be more than one fifth of the total number of 4.41 lakh cases reported in Bihar since COVID-19 struck the world in March last year.

The state has been clocking fresh cases in five digits, on a daily basis, for quite some time and the number of people testing positive in the last 24 hours was 13,374. Patna, with 17,187 active cases and 683 casualties, remains the worst affected district.

Altogether 2391 people have lost their lives to the dreaded coronavirus across the state so far and 84 casualties have taken place in the last 24 hours alone. Total 1,03,895 tests were conducted in the state since Tuesday, while over 2.62 clinical examinations for the virus have been done in the state since the outbreak of the pandemic last year.

On the vaccination front, a total of 87,348 people were administered the jabs on Wednesday, while overall 69,55,027 have been inoculated so far. Following coronavirus surge, the state government Wednesday came out with more stringent restrictions.