Tirupati municipality declared 5 ' zones' after first Coronavirus case reported

Tirupati: The Tirupati municipal corporation has declared five municipal wards as " zones" soon after a positive case was reported in the temple town.

Local MLA Bhumana Karunakar Reddy said a person from ward 36 who had attended the Tablighi Jamaat in New Delhi and returned to the city on 24 March has tested positive for COVID-19. Civic officials have identified the person and kept his family members under quarantine, he said. Residents of the five red zones have to cooperate with the administration to prevent further spread of the virus, the MLA said.

Officials have declared wards 32, 35, 36, 37, and 38 as red zones to avoid further spread of the virus. Civic authorities have strictly limited the movement of people in these areas and started conducting a survey and sanitisation activity in the wards. Mr Karunakar Reddy and municipal commissioner P.S Girisha held an emergency meeting with house-surgeons and officials in the town on Thursday.

Civic chief P.S. Girisha said there are around 8,000 houses in the five wards and said 50 medical officers, 188 health teams, ward secretaries, ward volunteers, Asha workers, and other supporting staff members have been deployed to conduct a survey and collect data of people who returned from Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, and other places and those who attended the religious meet in New Delhi. The municipal commissioner explained that the officials have been spraying sodium hypo chloride and bleach as part of the sanitisation drive in the town.