One more journalist dies of COVID-19 in Odisha

Bhubaneswar: One more senior journalist in Odisha succumbed to COVID-19. The deceased was a 63-year-old male from Ganjam district.

The scribe identified as Simanchal Panda worked with a weekly Odia magazine.

Sources said his 34-year-old son Asit Panda had also died of the virus on July 8. But even after his death, swab samples of rest of the family members were not collected for the test. On July 12,  Simanchal fell sick and was rushed to a hospital in Buguda and later shifted to MKCG Medical College and Hospital. He along with all his family members, including his grand children, underwent COVID-19 test at the hospital and all tested positive.

While all of them were shifted to Aska COVID Care Centre immediately, the journalist succumbed to the virus at around 8 AM yesterday.

With this, total three journalists have died of the disease in the state.

Earlier on July 11, journalist Priyadarshi Patnaik of The Samaja died while undergoing treatment at KIMS COVID hospital in Bhubaneswar. He was a resident of Hinjili area in Ganjam district. The next day, another scribe named K. CH. Ratnam from Gajapati district  succumbed to coronavirus at a COVID hospital in Bhubaneswar. The 75-year-old journalist was working with ‘Eenadu’, a Telugu newspaper.