Mumbai lockdown news: Today’s updates | Mumbai News – Times of India

Amid prevalent chaos and uncertainty over access to the essential services and commodities during the lockdown, we bring you the latest updates from Mumbai.
Update at 8.43pm: The Odisha Bhavan administration has urged NMMC to carry out periodic sanitisation of the entire premises on weekly basis. The facility was completely taken over by the NMMC and converted it into a quarantine centre for Covid-19 with effect from April 20
Update at 7.37pm: Senior BJP leader Devendra Fadnavis on Tuesday asked Maharashtra chief minister Uddhav Thackeray to show “assertive leadership” amidst the coronavirus pandemic. (PTI)
Update at 6.30pm: The Bombay high court on Tuesday directed the Maharashtra government to furnish details about the steps or measures it had taken to set up Covid-19 testing facilities in all districts. (PTI)
Update at 4.58pm: Thousands of migrant workers gathered at Suncity grounds of Vasai on Tuesday, waiting for their turn to go to Vasai railway station and board trains to their native places. (ANI)
Update at 3.48pm: The death of a worker posted at Mumbai’s KEM hospital triggered a protest by employees on Tuesday alleging apathy by the city civic body towards their working conditions amidst the COVID-19 crisis. (PTI)
* Update at 2.34pm | After meticulous planning and sustained effort, railways mobilised its resources at very short notice and prepared 145 Shramik trains to depart from Maharashtra on May 26. These trains have already been notified for today from Maharashtra: Central Railways
* Update at 2.33pm | For May 25, railways had offered 125 trains for evacuation of migrants from Maharashtra but state govt was only able to give info for 41 trains till 2am on May 25. Out of these, only 39 trains could run as passengers couldn’t be brought by local authorities: Central Railways
* Update at 1.30pm: Migrants flock to Suncity ground in Vasai as seven trains expected to leave for UP today.
Over 8,000 people have gathered at the Suncity ground in Vasai as seven Shramik Special Trains are expected to depart for Uttar Pradesh on Tuesday.
The seven trains likely to leave from Vasai railway station include four to Jaunpur, two to Bhadohi and one to Gorakhpur.
The migrants, from the Vasai-Virar region, Mira-Bhayander, Thane are being medically examined. They will be boarded in buses and taken to the railway station depending on the train timing.

* Taj Trust to feed doctors for another month
Spelling relief for doctors, the Taj Public Service Welfare Trust has decided to extend their free meal services to frontline healthcare workers for another month.
TOI had earlier reported that BMC was scurrying for options after the understanding between the Trust and the civic body came to an end on May 23. “With the lockdown being extended in Mumbai, the Trust decided to extend its meals programme to healthcare workers by another month. Our decision to continue offering the initiative is based on popular requests from the medical fraternity,” said Indian Hotels Company (IHC) CEO Puneet Chhatwal. The Taj Trust is the philanthropic arm of IHC Ltd.
* The stifling summer heat and soaring humidity levels have compounded the problems of doctors and other frontline workers who have to stay zipped up in non-porous personal protective equipment for long stretches. Several doctors across Mumbai are reporting skin rashes, dehydration and blackouts.
* Thane municipal corporation is developing an online tracking, management system to provide real-time info on Covid-related infrastructure here, like location of ambulances or bed vacancies in dedicated hospitals. The administration has received flak after frequent instances of patients losing lives due to lack of information on crucial facilities.
* Two months on, KEM & Sion replace Kasturba as care hubs
When Covid first came to India in February, the BMC earmarked a 24-bed isolation facility at its Kasturba Hospital as its main battle station. But two months after the lockdown was announced, and having recorded 1,026 deaths and 31,789 patients, the ground realities in Mumbai have changed. Different hospitals have emerged as the main corona centres, wards with hotspots have become safer and newer medicines with tonguetwisting names have taken away the limelight from old medicines such as HCQS.
Now, the 2,000-plus-bed KEM Hospital in Parel, initially meant to be the haven for non-Covid patients in the city is Mumbai’s main Covid warrior. “Almost every day, we seem to be converting one of our normal wards into Covid zones,” said a senior doctor. The standalone CVTS building at KEM has more or less become a Covid-only structure.
As for Kasturba, its isolation bed count increased to 160 but it is now in the middle of the BMC Covid-care pyramid. “The minute we realize a patient is getting serious and has an underlying chronic disease, he is shifted to KEM or Sion Hospital,” said a BMC official. So Kasturba has low death rates, but KEM and Sion hospitals have recorded hundreds of deaths in May itself.
* Update at 9.36am: Death toll due to Covid-19 rises to 4,167, cases climb to 1,45,380 in the country, reports PTI quoting Union health ministry.
* The city reported its first Covid-19 death on March 17, six days after it reported the first case on March 11
While it took the city 34 days to reach the first 100 deaths since the first case was reported, the subsequent 100s came at smaller intervals. The first 100 deaths were reported on April 13 when Mumbai had 1,540 positive cases. The next 100 were added in 13 days, after which the intervals were reduced to single digits. The fourth, fifth and sixth hundred deaths were added in four days each. The fastest addition, from 734 to 800 deaths, came in two days: May 17 to 19. The subsequent intervals were 3 days each.
* In a bid to check the number of Covid-19 deaths, the BMC is fine-tuning its contact-tracing programme and will now quarantine up to 15 high-risk contacts—as against five earlier—of every positive patient from the slums.
While the new policy would drastically increase the number of people being tested, BMC commissioner I S Chahal on Monday told his health staff and assistant municipal commissioners (ward officers) to not worry about the increasing number of Covid-19 cases as long as deaths could be prevented.
* The fatality rate for Covid-19 in the city has been the highest at 8.1% for those aged above 60. The rate is exactly half at 4% for those in the age group of 40-60 years and less than 1% for those under 40, shows a BMC analysis of 988 deaths. The diabetes -hypertension combination has emerged as the biggest predominant underlying co-morbidity among the deceased.
* Flight display board showing a mass of cancellation, passengers in gloves and masks and air-hostesses in hazmat suits. Add to that heated exchanges between passengers and airline staff. The scene at Mumbai airport T2 on Monday was akin to a dysfunctional future flick as resumption of domestic flights got off to a turbulent start with 75% being cancelled following the state’s decision to limit flight movements to only 50 Sunday evening.
* The city on Monday crossed 1,000 Covid-19 deaths, 76 days after the virus entered Mumbai and two months after the countrywide lockdown was announced. The city’s death toll stood at 1,026 with the addition of 38 deaths on Monday; 736 of the 1,026 deaths have occurred in May alone.