Coronavirus COVID-19: Maharashtra announces new norms for orange & green zones, has maximum 43 testing labs in India

The Maharashtra government has also announced new norms for orange and green zones in the state. As per the new norm, those districts which have more than 15 positive cases but not a single new case in the last 14 days will come under the orange zone and those districts which have not seen any new positive cases in the last 28 days will come under the green zone.

Mumbai: As the government is trying to increase the number of COVID-19 testing in India, Maharashtra becomes the state having maximum testing labs in the country. Maharashtra has 43 COVID-19 testing lab in which 23 are government labs and 20 private labs which makes the state with maximum testing capacity.

The Maharashtra government is also planning to establish another 32 labs out of which 13 will be government labs and 19 private.

The Maharashtra government has also announced new norms for orange and green zones in the state. As per the new norm, those districts which have more than 15 positive cases but not a single new case in last 14 days will come under the orange zone and those districts which have not seen any new positive cases in the last 28 days will come under green zone.

State Health Minister Rajesh Tope said that the Maharashtra government has decided to conduct 75,000 rapid tests for COVID-19, as the Centre gave the conditional permission to the state for the same. He said, "Maharashtra government will do 75 thousand rapid tests for coronavirus soon as the Centre has given us conditional permission for rapid tests."

He informed that the government has decided to "give hydroxychloroquine as a precautionary measure" to COVID-19 patients in Dharavi, Mumbai. It will be taken care that the HCQ is not given to people with cardiac arrest history and to those who are above 60 years of age or below 15.

It is to be noted that Maharashtra is the worst-hit state with coronavirus in India. On Tuesday, the total number of cases in the state stood at 4,666 which includes 572 cured cases and 232 fatalities.

The total number of cases in India stood at 18601 which includes 14759 actives cases, 3251 discharged/cured cases and one migrant patient. India's death toll surge to 590 as per the Ministry of Health's latest data.