Even as Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) officials are scrambling to bring down the city’s Covid-19 graph, the stretch from Andheri, Vile Parle to Borivali continues to be a nightmare for the civic body in their fight against coronavirus. Six wards -- Borivali, Kandivali, Malad, Andheri East /West, Dadar and Mahim etc account for over 36 per cent of the city's total active cases. Over 34 per cent of the total cumulative cases in the city are from these areas.
Also, 29 per cent of total fatalities of the city are recorded in these six wards, making them the biggest worry of the BMC health officials.
The BMC's ward wise data on September 23 of the total the six wards shows that --- R central (Borivali, parts of Charkop), K west (Andheri west, Juhu), P north (Malad), K east ( Andheri east, VileParle), G North (Dadar, Mahim, Dharavi) and R south (Kandivali) have recorded 65,950 of the total 1,92,301 cumulative cases. Apart from that out of the 27,618 active cases in the city, these six wards have recorded 9,898. Furthermore, out of the total 8,655 deaths due to Covid-19 in the city, 2,536 fatalities have occurred in these six wards.
When Covid-19 outbreak was at its peak in the city during May-June, these wards reported fewer cases than the ones in south central Mumbai, which were the hotspots of coronavirus cases.
Civic officials have meanwhile attributed the rise in the number of cases in the north Mumbai belt including Borivali, Kandivali, Malad etc to carelessness of citizens who failed to use face masks after the lockdown was eased. "Majority of the cases detected on a daily basis turn out to be asymptomatic, making it difficult for us to trace and stop the spread," said a senior BMC official.
Cases in these wards have started emerging from high rises and not from slums. The BMC has now decided to approach housing societies and educate the members about the importance of social distancing and wearing masks. "We are maximising testing in the above wards. Besides this we have intensified containment strategies to arrest the growth rate of cases in these areas. We just need cooperation from the citizens," the official said.
Of the total 24 wards, five wards have over 10,000 cases, while only three wards as on September 23 have less than five thousand cases. The three wards with less than 5,000 cases are B ward (Dongri, Bhendi Bazaar, MasjidBunder, Mohammed Ali road), C ward (Kalbadevi, Pydhonie) and A ward (Churchgate, Fort, Colaba).
