Jharkhand registers its first COVID-19 fatality as nine new positive cases emerge in 24 hours

RANCHI: A 72-year-old man died of coronavirus in Bokaro district, the first COVID-19 death reported in Jharkhand, a health official said on Thursday.

The patient died on Wednesday night, Bokaro District Chief Medical Officer Ashok Kumar Pathak said.

The man was kept in the isolation ward of a hospital after he showed symptoms of the virus on April 5.

He was later tested positive for COVID-19, he said.

The state on Wednesday witnessed a sudden increase in COVID-19 cases as nine new patients were tested positive in which five were from Ranchi and four from Bokaro.

Notably, all the nine cases were found to have come in direct contact with the first and fourth woman in Ranchi and Bokaro respectively.

Principal Health Secretary Nitin Madan Kulkarni confirmed that nine new cases of COVID-19 were found in Ranchi after the test results came late in the night on Wednesday. Second COVID-19 case, however, was found at Vishnugarh in Hazaribagh after a man returned from Asansol in West Bengal.

“Five are from the same family from which a 54-year old woman was tested positive in Hindpiri of Ranchi on Monday, while four others also came in direct contact with the woman who was found positive in Bokaro; three are close relatives of the woman,” said Kulkarni.

Remarkably, a 54-year woman of Hindpiri had come in direct contact with the Malaysian woman, who was tested positive for the first time in Jharkhand after attending Tablighi Jamaat in Nizamuddin. The Bokaro woman also has a travel history of Bangaladesh who had gone there to take part in a religious congregation.

Official records from the State Government claimed that a total of 15, 186 persons have been quarantined at quarantine centres all over the State while 1, 31, 942 people have been home quarantined in their respective homes.