In the run up to Deepavali, the Coimbatore Corporation was worried that the city may witness a post-festive season spike in COVID-19 cases as people were out on street, shopping in large numbers.
In fact, for two or three days immediately after Deepavali, the Corporation had stepped up its sample collection and intensified door-to-door check for people with fever symptoms. But the data for the fortnight after Deepavali shows that the city saw a decrease in active COVID-19 cases in the last 10 days.
From 840 active cases on November 21, the city saw 776 active cases as on November 30, says an officer, adding that this was not the time to be complacent, though, as the Corporation will continue its high vigil for another 14 days.
Like the initial quarantine period of 28 days, the Corporation wants to maintain the vigil for 28 days to check any spike in positive cases.
In the last 10 days, the city also saw a decline in number of streets with active COVID-19 cases from 716 to 678.
Though there has been a reduction in the daily positive case count, the Corporation has not reduced the samples it lifts every day for testing; it continues to be around 2,800 a day. With the addition of another 1,000 samples getting collected every day by private organisations, the total samples collected every day in the city is nearly 4,000, the officer says.
The Corporation is continuing with mobile fever and sample collection booths in bus stands and fever clinics across the city.
The officer also says the Corporation is continuing with its strategy for containing a house or a portion of street or street depending on the number of cases there. And, it will continue to do so until the positive case count drops.
Meanwhile, Collector K. Rajamani told journalists on Tuesday that the positive cases that the city saw every day in the last few days were from Podanur, Ramanathapuram, Peelamedu, Ganapathy, Sowripalayam and a couple of other places.
He had asked the Corporation to step up its COVID-19 containment strategy in those localities and increase sample collection, if necessary.
As on December 1, there were 14 containment zones in the district and 13 of those were within the Corporation limit, he added.
