Kupwara, May 27 (KNO): At least 84 inmates at the district jail Kupwara have tested positive for the Covid-19 virus so far and six are stated to have recovered while the officials claimed that all the required facilities including proper isolation have been ensured.
Officials said that 20 cases were detected earlier, while 64 more inmates tested positive on Thursday.
Talking to news agency—Kashmir News Observer (KNO) Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) District Jail Kupwara Shahbaz Hussain said that a total of 270 inmates, only men are lodged there and all the facilities required for positive patients have been ensured.
“A total of 20 inmates had tested positive earlier of which six have recovered while 64 more tested positive today (Thursday)," he said. He maintained that all the required facilities are available for the positive patients besides the medical team comes to the jail premises for tests while a separate block has been prepared for patients.
Ghulam Nabi Sheikh Nodal Officer for Covid-19 said that a total of 84 jail inmates have tested positive for the novel coronavirus at district jail Kupwara till Thursday.
He said that the tests of all the jail inmates are done within the premises and positive cases are immediately isolated to the administrative designated facility in a bark adding that a total of 256 RT-PCR tests were conducted on Wednesday.
He said: “I have communicated with the concerned officials at district jail who have assured all the required facilities including proper isolation to inmates for all those who tested positive on Thursday.”
About the earlier 20 positive cases the nodal officer said: "We are expecting all of them to have recovered and In case of any need oxygen is provided with sufficient amount but as of now there is no such exigency while cylinders are available there.”
Sheikh said that all the earlier positive patients will undergo a re-test in a day or two and hopefully, all of them possibly may have recovered.
He informed that sufficient isolation beds have been prepared there besides all the jail inmates were made to undergo the Covid-19 test.
An official at the Covid control room said that samples under Rapid Antigen Test (RAT) were collected from the jail inmates on May 16 and the repeated RT-PCR test was done on May 24 in which all the 20 positive patients were detected positive again.
He said that no report of any jail inmate is awaited since results are received regularly on a daily basis.
Notably, till Wednesday, Kupwara district had alone reported a total of 11131 cases of which 9160 have recovered taking active positive cases to 1833 and 138 have died due to the virus—(KNO)