Srinagar: As the Covid cases are rising again in various parts of country, including a slight increase in Jammu and Kashmir, Director SKIMS (Sher-e-Kashmir Institute of Medical Science) Prof. Parvaiz A. Koul asked people not to panic and said following Covid appropriate Behavior (CAB) is important to follow and critical to contain further spread of the infection.
Prof Koul said that the situation is not worrisome as the positivity rate is not high so far and hence there is no need to panic but lowering guard and paying no heed to Covid guidelines can degenerate the situation.
As per reports, J&K reported 56 positive cases on Sunday, 37 from Jammu, seven in Srinagar, three each from Samba and Anantnag, two from Kulgam and one each from Udhampur, Kathua, Poonch, districts and Pulwama respectively. Among the total cases of 454798, 166844 are from the Jammu division and 287954 in Kashmir.
Pertinently, the Indian tourist rush in Kashmir has been increasing since the last year which could be the main reason for the spread of the virus, experts said.
The SKIMS director advised people to exercise caution in the face of recent reports of an increased number of COVID cases from various parts of the country.
“The rising numbers call for adoption of measures like use of masks and frequent hand washing in exercise of the abundant caution for prevention of the spread of the respiratory viruses in general and SARS CoV2 in particular”, he explained.
He further said modeling studies from credible institutes like the IHME, the University of Washington did not predicted any fresh COVID wave in the immediate future for the region of Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh. However, exercising caution is clearly beneficial so that we avoid any upsurge in the cases.
“The positivity rate among the tested samples is not high and the authorities are keeping a close watch on the situation. Since there are areas globally as also in the country, where the sporadic increase of cases is reported, it would be prudent to stay alert without any panic. We need not be complacent but at the same time, panic should not creep in”, he further said.
(With Inputs from GNS)
