10 Day Lockdown

With Kerala reporting nearly 42,000 cases on Wednesday, the highest-ever single day spike, the state government announced a nine-day complete lockdown in the state from 8 May morning to curb the spread of the virus. The lockdown will come into force on 8 May morning and extend up to 16 May, according to official sources. Strict lockdown-like restrictions are already in place in the southern state and the Pinarayi Vijayan government decided to clamp the complete shutdown in the wake of a severe spike in the positive cases.

According to a report in Mathurbhoomi, the govt announced the complete lockdown after the state police department reported that restrictions which came to effect on Tuesday, was not as effective as expected. Earlier on Wednesday, after Kerala reported the highest-ever single day spurt in positive cases adding 41,953 infections, Vijayan had described the situation as serious and said stringent measures will have to be taken to curb the surge. The government  also announced several other decisions to strengthen the anti-COVID measures by deploying medical students and government officials to tackle the situation on the ground.

He also wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi that the state should be allotted 50 lakh doses of Covishield vaccine and 25 lakh doses of Covaxin. The Centre should take into account the number of people waiting for the second dose and those who have registered for the first dose while allocating vaccines to the states.