Four more test positive for COVID-19 in Assam; state tally rises to 41

Four persons, including two women, tested positive for COVID-19 in Assam's Bongaigaon district on Thursday, taking the total number of such cases in the state to 41, Health Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said.

In a first in the state, the patients -- three from Bongaigaon town and one from Chaprakat -- were found to have no contact history. Their samples were sent for COVID-19 examination as they had fever.

Of the total cases reported in the state so far, 29 have recovered and one person has succumbed to the disease.

"Four more coronavirus positive cases reported from Bongaingaon district. The number of COVID-19 patients in Assam now stands at 41. Twenty-nine discharged, one death. So active hospital cases 11," Sarma tweeted.

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Bongaigaon has emerged as the new 'red zone' in the state with five cases in a week, including that of a 16-year-old girl who tested positive for the disease on Tuesday, Sarma told reporters, adding the deputy commissioner will declare areas within three-km radius of the residences of those affected as containment zone.

"Patients are being taken to Mahendra Mohan Choudhury Hospital in Guwahati," he said.

Altogether six persons have tested positive for COVID-19 this week. A 61-year-old person from Goalpara was found to have contracted the disease on Tuesday.

Apart from Bonagaigaon, Assam has five other districts in the 'red zone' -- Golaghat, Nalbari, Dhubri, Goalpara and Morigaon.

Sarma said that Golaghat and Nalbari districts are expected to come out of the Red Zone over the next few days.

Containment zone restrictions at a high-end apartment in Guwahati, where one person had tested positive, was lifted on Thursday.

Assam has so far tested 9,520 samples, of which 41 tested positive for COVID-19, Results of 708 samples are still awaited.