COVID-19: Tripura minister says situation much better than rest of India

Agartala: Tripura is in a much better position than the rest of the country in terms of COVID-19 crisis, said education minister and cabinet spokesperson Ratan Lal Nath on Thursday.

He said that Tripura’s position is better than the national average in positivity rate, death rate, recovery rate and sample testing in comparison to many states in India.

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Speaking at a press conference at the Secretariat, Nath said at one point, the COVID-19 situation was critical in the state, but things were improving slowly.

With 362 COVID-19 deaths, Tripura has the second-highest death tally in the Northeast after Assam (958) as of Friday.

“But there is still no chance of complacency. We cannot take the risk of negligence or carelessness in fighting the virus,” Nath said.

He also said that at one point, there were more than 200 containment zones in Tripura. Now there is only one containment zone in Nalschar rural development block in Sepahijala district. He said there are currently 884 active coronaviruses patients in Tripura, of which 673 of them are in home isolation.

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The current recovery rate in Tripura is 96.12 per cent, which is better than 27 other states in the country and the recovery rate is gradually increasing, he said.

“The health infrastructure in Tripura is weaker than many other states in the country. Nevertheless, in terms of recovery rate, Tripura has surpassed Delhi, West Bengal and Maharashtra”, Nath added.

The education minister further said that Tripura is currently testing 1,25,813 samples per 10 lakh on an average, which is better than 20 Indian states.

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“Big states like West Bengal, Orissa, Bihar, Haryana, Gujarat lag behind Tripura in the number of samples tested per million. Tripura is also in a better position than the 16 states in the country in terms of positivity rate. Even, the national average 6.97 per cent is higher than Tripura’s 6.41 per cent rate”, Nath said.

Tripura also has a better mortality rate than 19 other states in the country. The current mortality rate in Tripura is 1.12 per cent, in comparison to/ the national average is 1.47 per cent.