Goa tourism hit by COVID-19

Panaji : Goa Health Minister Vishwajit Rane said that the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak has already started taking a toll on the state's tourism with people cancelling holidays and events getting pushed back.

The coronavirus outbreak, which started in December from Wuhan in China, has since killed more than 3,300 people and infected nearly 1,00,000 in about 85 nations.

The epidemic has wreaked havoc on international business, tourism, sports events and schools, with almost 300 million students sent home worldwide.

In order to stall the spread of the virus, Rane asked people to avoid attending functions or watch films in theatres for two to three months, and said greeting each other with a 'namaste' was better than shaking hands.

"One more suspect has tested positive for COVID-19. The COVID-19 confirmed case has a travel history of Thailand and Malaysia. The patient is in hospital quarantine and stable. There are now 31 confirmed cases in the country. This includes 16 Italian nationals," the Health Ministry said in a statement.

Hundreds of widows in Vrindavan will not play Holi this year in view of the coronavirus outbreak.

The Sulabh Foundation that has been working for the welfare of widows, said that it has been decided that the Holi celebrations will be put off.

"Holi celebrations lead to huge crowds and playing with water would make the widows, most of whom are old, susceptible to infection," the spokesman said.

Vrindavan''s Holi celebrations in recent years have become a memorable event for the thousands of widows who till recent past used to face humiliation.

In 2012, the Supreme Court expressed concern that the government and its agencies were not doing enough to mitigate the sufferings of the widows of Vrindavan and asked Sulabh International, an NGO, to take care of them.

In a bizarre case, a policeman allegedly faked coronavirus infection for his failure to record the statement of a molestation victim.

The matter came to light after an audio clip in which the cop, identified as sub-inspector Ram Sevak, who was deployed at Chakeri police station in Kanpur, was heard saying that he suffered from coronavirus infection.

The audio clip went viral on the social media on Thursday. According to the sources, Ram Sevak was investigating a case of molestation lodged a few days back.

The victim''s family alleged that the SI neither arrested the accused nor bothered to record the victim''s statement.

"I was joking," he said, when confronted by senior officials.

The public ceremony at the Attari-Wagah border where 20,000 to 25,000 people participate every day has been put on hold in view of the Coronavirus fears.

BSF troopers will continue performing the Retreat ceremony. "As per govt guidelines, congregations are to be avoided, hence visitors to ceremony will not be entertained and it will be conducted without visitors," the BSF said.

Deserted streets, no private vehicles on the roads and public transport virtually absent -all these tell the grim story of Chinese city of Wuhan, the ground zero of the coronavirus outbreak, according to a student from Maharashtra who recently returned from the neighbouring country.

Ashish Kurme, an MBBS student studying at a university near Wuahan, said the first case of the novel coronavirus (Covid-19) was detected on December 8, 2019, but he came to know about the outbreak only in the first week of January.

"Videos showing dead bodies lying on the roads in Wuhan were fake. I came to know about these videos after coming back to India," said Kurme, who is in his early 20s.

Iran announced a surge in coronavirus cases and 17 more deaths including an advisor to the foreign minister, raising the total number of people killed to 124.

The Vatican confirmed the walled city-state's first case of the new coronavirus on Friday and closed some offices as a precaution while Pope Francis continued recovering from a cold.