By ARUN P RATAP SINGH
DEHRADUN, 1 Dec: A sudden jump in fresh cases of Corona was reported today in Uttarakhand. As per the health bulletin issued by Uttarakhand Health Department, this evening, 53 fresh cases were detected today in the state during the past 24 hours. Of course, there was no death from Corona in past 24 hours while 11 patients were reported to have recovered from Corona in the past 24 hours. With this fresh jump in the Corona positive cases, the number of active patients of Corona has now increased to 183. Whereas yesterday, there were 141 active patients in the state. Rapid Antigen test of five thousand policemen was conducted in past 24 hours in Uttarakhand and out of them 18were foundto be Corona positive. According to the bulletin issued by the Health Department, the test report of 14,088 samples has come negative on Wednesday. Not a single new case was reported in the eight districtsnamely, Almora, Bageshwar, Chamoli, Champawat, Rudraprayag, Tehri, Udham Singh Nagar and Uttarkashi in past 24 hours At the same time, the maximum number of 29 infected patients have been found in Nainital, eight in Dehradun, 14 in Haridwar, one each in Pauri and Pithoragarh. Meanwhile, with fresh orders in place for stricter vigil, monitoring and random testing at ISBT, at Asarodi Check Post, at the Jolly Grant Airport as well as the Railway Stations has been increased. However, the question remains whether the state is conducting enough Covid tests or not. Given the sudden rise and the possibility of third wave and arrival of new Covid variant Omicron, as per the experts, the state ought to be conducting at least 40,000 tests daily of locals only, apart from of those arriving from other places to Uttarakhand. Uttarakhand government issued SOPs against Omicron and to increase and conduct random checks at tourist places too but the questions remain if that is being taken in earnest even as the infection rate has again started climbing in the state and now stands at 0.37 percent It may be recalled that so far, the total number of corona infected in the state has increased to 3,44,303. Of these, 3,30,557 people have been cured. A total of 7,408 people have lost their lives due to corona in the state. The recovery rate of the state has been recorded at 96.01 percent and infection rate of 0.37 percent.