WHY CHENNAI REMAINS A HOTSPOT

Capital Records Daily Avg Of 13 Cases; Large Number Of Close Contacts Testing Positive; Journalists Emerging As New Cluster

22.04.2020

Pushpa.Narayan@timesgroup.com

One in every five Covid-19-positive cases in Tamil Nadu till Monday was reported in Chennai, making it the largest hotspot in the state. With 303 of the 1,520 across the state, the capital registers an average of 13 cases a day.

The rate of increase in Chennai is much higher when compared to Coimbatore, which has the second largest number of cases, 134. Coimbatore records a daily average of seven cases, while Tirupur, which has 109 cases, reports an average of five cases a day.

On Sunday, Chennai reported 50 cases, nearly half of the 105 cases in the state. The next day, when the number of cases in the state dropped to 45, Chennai topped the list with 18. On Tuesday, 55 of the 76 people who tested positive in TN were from Chennai.

After more than four weeks of lockdown, the number of people with travel history testing positive has dropped drastically, but a large number of their close contacts are now testing positive. A majority of such cases are in north Chennai.

While the state as whole deals with the Tablighi Jamaat cluster and their contacts, Chennai has a second cluster emerging: among journalists. “We now have a new cluster among journalists and media personnel in the Chennai. There is already a cluster of about a dozen healthcare workers, including seven doctors at the Rajiv Gandhi Government General Hospital,” said a senior epidemiologist tracking cases at the state control room.

Each person in this group is considered a primary source. “We will be testing their close contacts and family to see if the infection has spread. As of now we don’t know if there are clusters from visitors of Pheonix Mall where two employees tested positive. We have not tested people who visited the place,” the doctor said.

The pattern in Chennai is similar to that of many metros, said director of public health Dr K Kolandasamy. “Chennai is densely populated and hence the spread is more rapid,” he said. A more densely populated Mumbai bears 44% of Maharashtra’s load, Hyderabad has 39% of Telangana’s cases, Bengaluru houses 24% of Karnataka’s cases and Kolkata 26% of Bengal’s positive cases.

In a densely populated area the spread of infection is faster. For instance, for every primary source tested positive, the number of their family members and contacts testing positive is higher in Chennai than any other district. Officials say that more samples are drawn in urban centres than in rural areas.

Chennai has the largest number of testing facilities and hospitals in the state. Nearly half of the 33 testing laboratories are in Chennai. “The number of samples drawn is relatively more in cities. When you test more people, you see more positive cases,” said Kolandasamy.