Owing to a rise in COVID-19 cases, the government of Gujarat announced night curfew in cities of Ahmedabad, Vadodara, Surat, Rajkot, Bhavnagar, Jamnagar, Gandhinagar and Junagadh from 25th December.
According to Gujarat Chief Minister's Office, the night curfew shall be in force from 11pm to 5am from December 25 in the cities in view of current COVID-19 situation.
The announcement comes a day after CM Bhupendra Patel on Thursday held a high-level meeting to review the situation of Covid-19 in the state in light of the Omicron variant of the virus circulating in the state.
Last month, the state government had relaxed the night curfew timings by two hours in light of decreasing Covid-19 cases. Earlier, the night curfew were from 12 am to 6 am.
Gujarat reported 111 new cases of COVID-19, taking its overall tally to 8,28,905 on Thursday, while two more patients succumbed to the infection in the state.
Of the total 23 Omicron variant cases detected in the state till date, four patients have been discharged, pegging the number of active cases at 19. The Omicron infected are mostly with travel history, from Tanzania, Zimbabwe, The United Kingdom, Dubai and Congo.
The meeting was attended by Gujarat health minister Rushikesh Patel and minister of state for health Nimisha Suthar, chief secretary to the chief minister K Kailashnathan, chief secretary Pankaj Kumar, additional chief secretary of home department Raj Kumar, additional chief secretary of health department Manoj Aggarwal, health commissioner Jai Prakash Shivhare, and other state officials.
According to a government release, arrangements for testing and contact tracing of tourists arriving in Gujarat from foreign countries were reviewed. So far, 85 per cent of the state’s eligible population is fully vaccinated.