india

Updated: Apr 20, 2020 13:32 IST

Gujarat recorded 108 new coronavirus infections on Monday, a day after recording more than 360 cases of Covid-19, news agency ANI reported citing the state’s health department.

Gujarat now has 1851 cases, including 106 patients who have been discharged and 67 deaths, the agency said.

Gujarat’s health department data shows about two-thirds of the total cases in the state were reported from the capital, Ahmedabad, which has emerged as a Covid-19 hotspot city.

The western state has now become the third most affected in the country after Maharashtra, which has 4203 cases, and Delhi with 2003 cases.

Gujarat had said on Sunday that were 367 new coronavirus disease cases in a big spurt of cases.

Jayanti Ravi, principal secretary of the health and family welfare department, had attributed the spurt to a large number of test results sent back from government and private laboratories late on Saturday.

“We have got 29,104 people tested, of which 27361 tests were negative. We were expecting the increase as many of those tested had symptoms and we are well prepared to deal with the situation,” she had said.

“Compared to the national average of 269 tests per million, we are conducting 447.8. More tests would result in the identification of more positive cases quickly,” the principal secretary said.

The health department data showed that Covid-19 has now spread to 29 of the 33 districts in the state, which last month was restricted to five.

The state government has decided to allow factories in municipal corporation and town council areas to restart from Monday.

It was also decided at a meeting chaired by chief minister Vijay Rupani that these units would arrange accommodation for the workers within the factory premises and ensure that they don’t have to travel much, officials familiar with the matter had said.

India’s number of coronavirus disease cases rose to 17,265 on Monday including 14,175 active cases, 2546 cured, discharged or migrated people and 543 deaths, according to the Union health ministry.