NEW DELHI, Feb 24: A second wave of coronavirus epidemic is looming large across the country as five more States, apart from Maharashtra and Kerala, have reported a surge in the cases in the last few days.

An alarmed Central Government has cautioned all the States against dropping their guard againt the spread of covid and asked them to step up testing and surveillance. Tamil Nadu, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka and Punjab are the new States that in the past few days witnessed a surge prompting the authorities to enforce strict restrictions like banning public gatherings.

Health experts suggest restrictions on gatherings and inter-State travel as the most effective weapons alongwith compulsory wearing of face masks at this juncture. Night curfew has been marked as more of a political stunt than being effective.

Karnataka has already enforced curbs on travellers from Maharashtra and Kerala. It has made it mandatory for people travelling from Kerala and Maharashtra to carry negative RT-PCR report.

Night curfew has been clamped in many districts of Maharashtra and Punjab. The Health Ministry has said there have been 187 strains of corona found in the country. It said although there is a surge in cases, there has not been a corresponding rise in casualties, which are under control.

A new finding is that cluster infections are emerging like in Bengaluru, multiple cases emerging from one building. Experts say there are 3 variants in India and called for genome testing on a wider scale.

It is happening in UP and Delhi also slightly. By mid-September in India the epidemic had reached its peak and by November the number started coming down fast.

On Sunday alone, the country recorded 14,199 new cases in the country, up from 10,000 cases till two days earlier.

Maharashtra continues to report the highest daily new cases at 6,971. It is followed by Kerala with 4,070 while Tamil Nadu reported 452 new cases. In the last 24 hours, Maharashtra saw the maximum casualties (35) and Kerala reported 15 deaths, out of the national figure of 83 deaths.