2 women attend weddings in UP, Punjab; now test Covid positive

Two women, who attended a number of weddings in the past few days, are among the four new Covid cases in Lucknow.

One of the women had visited Punjab recently while another attended several weddings in Lucknow last week.

The woman with travel history to Punjab is a resident of Aashiana. She had gone there to attend a wedding on December 12. She had tested negative at the airport on arrival.

The other woman, who lives in New Hyderabad locality, got herself tested because she wanted to consult a doctor on some health issues.

The health department officials said they have informed the officials in Punjab about the woman so that they can begin contact tracing.

District surveillance officer Dr Milind Vardhan, said, "We are now making the contact list of the women from New Hyderabad locality for testing."

Two other people, who tested positive, were parents of a student who returned from Bengaluru recently. Both of them are asymptomatic.

A senior health official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that contact tracing of patients, who have attended weddings, is an onerous task.

"Even the patients do not remember all the people they met at these functions. Contact tracing is therefore a near impossible task. Weddings can end up being super spreaders because no one follows Covid protocols."

Meanwhile, the health department vaccinated 26,691 people against Covid-19 during a mass inoculation drive.

As many as 18,105 people received the second dose and 8,586 took the first on Thursday.