GUWAHATI, May 25: The Assam government has decided to extend the curfew till June 5, given that the COVID scenario in the state, barring Kamrup Metropolitan district, has not improved much.
“There will be no lockdown but the curfew, which is currently in effect from 12 noon to 5am in the urban areas, has been extended to June 5, 2021. At the same time, the curfew in the rural areas has been preponed to 2pm from 5pm and the same has been extended to June 5,” chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma told reporters on Tuesday.
Sarma said that though the COVID surge has been restricted in the state, with the high number of tests (over one lakh per day) the absolute cases are hovering around the 6,000 mark every day.
“Except Guwahati, the scenario is not improving substantially in other parts of the state,” he said, adding that “while positivity rate is coming down, the number of people getting infected is not decreasing much. However, there is an indication of the situation improving in the next ten days.”
Assam reported 84 COVID-triggered deaths on Monday.
The chief minister expressed concern at the consistently high COVID fatalities every day, even as he attributed the trend to late reporting in hospitals and home isolation by not adhering to the guidelines.
The chief minister further said that there was an adequate stock of oxygen in the state and that Assam has been supplying 15 metric tonnes of oxygen to the other Northeastern states every day.
“Moreover, Assam will receive 160 MT of oxygen every week through the Oxygen Express, which will come twice weekly with 80 MT capacity per trip,” he added.
He informed that the state government continued its efforts to ramp up health infrastructure including adding more ICU beds, increasing oxygen availability, et al, besides working on a plan to set up oxygen plants in every district hospital to meet future demands.