Kolkata: The sustained efforts by Kolkata Municipal Corporation to control the spread of COVID-19 in the densely populated slums in the city have seen significant improvement as a number of bustees shed off its red tag and turned into green.
With the significant drop in the numbers of containment zones in Kolkata from 339 to 286, Firhad Hakim, the chairperson of KMC's Board of Administrators informed that the densely populated slums of Rajabazar and Belgachia have turned green.
The slums have not recorded a single positive case of COVID-19 in recent times include Belgachia slum in North Kolkata, which has four positive cases a month back and Kachari Bagan bustee at Dhapa. The slum in Garden Reach area under ward 135 recorded not a single positive case for over a fortnight except earlier positive cases of one or two dwellers. Even the Rajabazar slum areas where the apprehension of spread was quite high has hardly had a positive case.
"A major challenge on our part was to curb the spread of COVID -19 virus in the slum areas of Kolkata. The chances of the disease spreading in the slums are quite high considering the fact that it is difficult for the people to maintain social distancing in the claustrophobic living conditions. We have reached out to every single slum house spreading awareness and conducting tests of dwellers with the slightest symptom," said Swapan Samaddar, Member of KMC's Board of Administrator looking after the Bustee Development.