The civic administration, after reviewing the situation, has been declaring containment zones adopting a strategy of micro-containment. It first declared 69 micro-containment zones and then revised it to 65. (Representational)
The PMC may have been able to slow the spread of Covid-19 within city limits with measures in containment zones but new hotbeds have emerged, along with one that has resurfaced as a hotspot. This has forced the civic administration to extend its containment strategy in these areas.
The administration, after reviewing the situation, has been declaring containment zones adopting a strategy of micro-containment. It first declared 69 micro-containment zones and then revised it to 65. The PMC has a total of 6,483 patients as of May 31 as against 3,307 by May 16, which is less than double the number.
The PMC has worked hard to contain the spread of the infection in Tadiwala Road-Sassoon hospital ward, Yerawada, Khadakmal Ali-Mahatma Phule Peth ward, Pune University-Wakdewadi ward and Navipeth-Parvati ward. The administration has managed to decrease the doubling rate in the last 15 days in the most affected wards, Tadiwala Road-Sassoon hospital and Yerawada. But both continued to register additional 513 and 327 cases, respectively, during the period. The Tadiwala Road-Sassoon hospital ward and Yerawada ward had recorded 586 and 338 patients, respectively, up to May 16.
“The PMC has seen 1,450 patients registered from outside containment areas in the last 15 days. Thus, it is necessary to redefine containment wards as per the situation,” said Municipal Commissioner Shekhar Gaikwad.
However, the PMC is concerned about new hotbeds, including Koregaon Park-Ghorpadi ward. It has recorded a rise of 324 cases from 19 up to May 16 to 343 on May 31. The Salisbury Park-Maharishinagar ward too recorded a steep jump from 66 to 235 cases and Janta Vasahat-Dattawadi ward recorded a spike from 18 to 158 cases in 15 days. Also, Market Yard-Lower Indiranagar ward registered 100 new cases from 79 to 179 in the same time period.
The efforts of the PMC have been effective in certain areas, where the number of cases has gone down. The Khadakmalali-Mahatma Phule Peth ward recorded a rise from 294 to 367 cases, which is around 25 per cent increase. The Rastapeth-Raviwarpeth ward recorded a rise from 167 to 210 cases while Navi Peth-Parvati ward had an increase from 220 to 283 cases. There was a slowdown in the spread of infection at Pune university-Wakdewadi ward with cases coming down to 385 from 395, Kondhwa Khurd-Meethanagar ward recorded around 50 per cent rise from 88 to 133 cases and in Sahakarnagar-Padmavati ward, cases rose from 121 to 188.
There is no single ward that has not recorded a new case in the last 15 days. In fact, the wards least affected at the initial stage have recorded cases in the last few days.