UP reports 5,156 new COVID-19 cases, state minister among those who test positive

A total of 53 fresh deaths due to COVID-19 were reported during this period, taking the number of fatalities to 2,638, a senior official said. Minister of State for MSME, Khadi and Village Industry, Chaudhary Udaybhan Singh, tested positive for coronavirus on Wednesday and has been admitted to Sanjay Gandhi Postgraduate Institute of Medical Sciences (SGPI) here.

Uttar Pradesh on Wednesday reported 5,156 fresh COVID-19 cases, including that of a state minister, taking the tally to 1,67,510. A total of 53 fresh deaths due to COVID-19 were reported during this period, taking the number of fatalities to 2,638, a senior official said.

Minister of State for MSME, Khadi and Village Industry, Chaudhary Udaybhan Singh, tested positive for coronavirus on Wednesday and has been admitted to Sanjay Gandhi Postgraduate Institute of Medical Sciences (SGPI) here. Singh has tested positive and admitted to the hospital, SGPGI Director Prof. R K Dhiman said.

The minister had also informed about his condition on his Twitter handle, asking those who had met him recently to get themselves tested. Chaudhary, 54, a BJP MLA from Fatehpur Sikri in Agra, had got himself tested ahead of the Uttar Pradesh Assembly session beginning on Thursday.

Minister of State for Health and Family Welfare, Atul Garg, is presently undergoing treatment in a Ghaziabad hospital for coronavirus. Besides, two other state ministers Kamal Rani Varun and Chetan Chauhan had recently died of COVID-19. Additional Chief Secretary Amit Mohan Prasad said the state's case fatality rate (CFR) has come down to 1.57 per cent, which is below the national percentage of 1.97, and the state's recovery rate presently is 68.78.

A total of 1,15,227 people have recovered and been discharged from hospitals while the number of active cases was 49,645, he said, adding that in the past three days since August 16, the number of active cases has come down by almost 2,000 indicating that more people are recovering from the infection than those falling prey to it. Among the active cases, 24,127 are presently in home isolation while 1,766 others were in private hospitals and 281 in semi-paid facilities.

Among the 53 deaths, maximum of seven have been reported from Lucknow, followed by three each from Varanasi and Moradabad and two each in Kanpur Nagar, Gorakhpur, Prayagraj, Meerut, Ghazipur, Basti, Hardoi, Mathura, Sant Kabirnagar, Lakhimpur Kheri, Etawah and Sonebhadra, among others, a government bulletin said. Maximum fresh cases were reported from Lucknow (767), Kanpur Nagar (414), Gorakhpur (353), among others, the bulletin said.

On Tuesday, over 1.07 lakh tests were performed, taking the total number of tests conducted in the state to over 40.75 lakh, which is the highest in the country, Prasad said. A network of 62,498 COVID help desks has been set up in the state, which has helped identify over 6.60 lakh symptomatic patients, he added.