Two persons died in the last 24 hours due to Covid-19 including a senior government medical officer who was tested positive for Coronavirus a week ago. Forty people were detected Covid-19 positive since yesterday taking the total active cases to 461. The coronavirus death toll in the state is 20.

Paying tribute to the medical officer, chief minister Mamata Banerjee today tweeted, “We have lost Dr Biplab Kanti Dasgupta, Assistant Director, Health Services, West Bengal in the early hours of today. He was Assistant Director of Health Services, Central Medical Stores… We are deeply pained with his untimely demise. His sacrifice for the cause of ailing humanity will ever be in our hearts and will make our Covid warriors fight the deadly virurs with even greater determination. My heartfelt condolence to Dr Dasgupta’s bereaved family members and colleagues.”

The 60 year-old doctor, the first medical professional to die of the disease in Bengal, was undergoing treatment at the critical care unit of a private hospital at Salt Lake for the past couple of weeks with severe breathing trouble, cough and cold and other co-morbidities such as diabetes and cardiac ailments. No further coronavirus patients were discharged from hospitals in the last 24 hours.

A total of 105 covid-19 positive people have been cured. Till now, 10,893 samples have been tested for Coronavirus. With Kolkata, Howrah, North 24-Parganas and East Midnapore being included in the coronavirus red zone, police have taken up stringent measures for enforcing the lockdown including surveillance through drones and CCTV cameras, bike patrolling, route march, shifting of markets, setting up of naka check points and sanitisation of buildings.

Foodgrains and cooked food have been distributed with the help of NGOs in some areas under complete lockdown. Again police distributed medicines and ration to senior citizens after receiving phone calls from some areas in Howrah. In Howrah, from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. today, nine people were arrested and two vehicles were seized in connection to flouting lockdown norms.