Agra, Oct 4 : Garbage has piled up in Agra due to ongoing strike by a section of safai karamcharis of the Municipal Corporation to demand justice in the Hathras gang rape-murder case, compounding an already grave health situation amid the coronavirus pandemic. The City of the Taj produces more than 800 tonnes of garbage daily, that needs to be collected and dumped at landfill sites. However, this has come to a standstill since sweepers and garbage collectors have been on strike for the past three days. Municipal Commissioner Tikaram Funde maintained that only a section of the MC workforce was creating nuisance. "Some outsourced safai karamcharis have been sacked while others have been identified and would be dealt with firmly," he said. A section of the agitating workers even pelted police with stones near the Kothi Meena Bazar ground on Saturday. The city reported 44 new coronavirus cases in the last 24 hours, taking the tally to 5,895 and active cases to 625. The recovery rate improved to nearly 85 per cent. Health officials said that a big worry right now was the shortage of blood at the 18 blood banks in the city, as people were not voluntarily coming forward to donate blood due to the Covid-19 scare. An analysis of data for the past few months underlines the importance of stricter precautionary measures to protest the younger generation. More younger people between the age of 21 and 40 were getting being infected compared with those above 60. Till October 2, as many as 2,545 coronavirus patients were between 21 and 40 years of age, 1,970 in 41-60 age bracket and 862 above 60. /IANS