By PTI
AHMEDABAD: Gujarat minister Jitubhai Chaudhari on Wednesday said he has tested positive for coronavirus, while three senior IAS officers have also been diagnosed with the infection in the state.
Notably, Chaudhari, Minister of State for Narmada, Kalpasar and Fisheries, has contracted the virus for a second time in nine months.
Earlier, he was infected with COVID-19 in April last year during the second wave of the pandemic.
“My Rapid Antigen Test gave a positive result (for COVID-19) today. RT-PCR results are yet to come. I have isolated myself at home. I have urged people, who came into my contact recently, to get themselves tested,” he said in a statement.
On Tuesday, senior IAS officer Manoj Aggarwal, who was heading the state Health Department as its Additional Chief Secretary, was found positive for coronavirus.
On Wednesday, three more senior IAS officers – JP Gupta, Rajkumar Beniwal and Commissioner of Health JP Shivahare – were found positive for coronavirus, said Health Officer of Gandhinagar Municipal Corporation Dr Kalpesh Goswami.
Meanwhile, the state government on Wednesday gave additional charge of the Health Department to the Principal Secretary in the Urban Development Department, Mukesh Kumar.
Gujarat reported 50 new cases of the Omicron variant on Wednesday, taking the tally of such cases in the state to 204, the health department said.
On the other hand, 16 patients of this coronavirus variant were discharged from hospitals, which took the total of Omicron infection recoveries to 112.
Ahmedabad city alone accounted for 34 of the 50 new cases, raising its tally of Omicron infections to 93.
Against this, 41 such patients have recovered in the city so far.
Vadodara city reported five new cases of Omicron, Kheda district four, Anand and Surat three cases each and Kutch one case.
The daily COVID-19 cases in Gujarat on Wednesday crossed the 3,000-mark for the first time after May 26 last year with the addition of 3,350 infections, raising the state’s tally to 8,40,643, the health department said.
Gujarat had reported 3,794 cases on May 23, 2021.
The daily tally had crossed 3,000 again on May 26.
The day before, Gujarat had seen 2,265 new cases.
A total of 236 patients were discharged after treatment, which increased the overall number of recoveries in Gujarat to 8,19,523 so far, the department said in a release.
The number of active cases in Gujarat crossed the 10,000-mark to reach 10,994.
With one patient succumbing to the COVID-19 infection in Amreli, the cumulative toll in Gujarat mounted to 10,126, as per the release.
Ahmedabad city alone reported 1,637 fresh cases.
Ahmedabad district saw 1,660 cases, the highest number in Gujarat during the day.
Surat reported 690 new cases, Vadodara 181, Rajkot 159, Anand 114, and Kheda 84, the department said.
5.26 lakh more people were administered vaccine doses, including 2.80 lakh in the 15-18 age group, taking the total number of doses administered so far in Gujarat to 9.18 crore.
The Union Territory of Dadra and Nagar Haveli, Daman and Diu reported 20 fresh cases, including 17 in Daman, raising the tally of confirmed cases to 10,696.
The UT is now left with 33 active cases after 10,659 recoveries so far and four fatalities, officials said.
Gujarat’s COVID-19 figures are as follows: Positive cases 8,40,643, new cases 3,350, death toll 10,126, discharged 8,19,523, active cases 10,994, people tested so far – figures not released.