Single day spikes of COVID cases a worrying trend for India

New Delhi: In India, where daily rising COVID-19 numbers are a major cause of concern, AIIMS began Phase 1 of human trials of COVID-19 vaccines on Monday, results of which are expected in three months.  

Covid cases saw a new high on Tuesday as India's COVID-19 tally zoomed past 11 lakh cases with a whopping 37,148 new detections in one day. The total cases in India so far are now 11,55,191 while overall deaths are 28,084 out of which 587 were recorded in the last 24 hours.

 

There are 4,02,529 active cases of the coronavirus infection currently in the country, while 7,24,577 people have recovered till now. Thus, 62.72 per cent people have recovered so far, it said.

The total number of confirmed cases includes foreigners.

This is the sixth consecutive day when COVID-19 cases increased by more than 30,000.

Of the 587 deaths reported in the last 24 hours, 176 are from Maharashtra, 72 from Karnataka, 70 from Tamil Nadu, 54 from Andhra Pradesh, 46 from Uttar Pradesh, 35 each from West Bengal and Delhi, 20 from Gujarat, 17 from Madhya Pradesh and 10 from Jammu and Kashmir.

Nine fatalities have been reported from Rajasthan, followed by eight in Punjab, seven in Telangana, six each in Haryana and Odisha, four in Jharkhand, three in Uttarakhand, two each in Tripura and Meghalaya, and one each in Assam, Goa, Chhattisgarh, Kerala and Puducherry.

According to Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), a cumulative total of 1,43,81,303 samples have been tested up to July 20 with 3,33,395 samples being tested on Monday.

Of the total 28,084 deaths reported so far, Maharashtra accounted for the highest 12,030 fatalities followed by Delhi with 3,663 deaths, Tamil Nadu 2,551, Gujarat 2,162, Karnataka 1,403, Uttar Pradesh 1,192, West Bengal 1,147, Madhya Pradesh 738 and Andhra Pradesh 696.

So far, 568 people have died of COVID-19 in Rajasthan, 422 in Telangana, 355 in Haryana, 262 in Punjab, 254 in Jammu and Kashmir, 217 in Bihar, 97 in Odisha, 58 in Assam, 55 in Uttarakhand, 53 in Jharkhand and 43 in Kerala.

Puducherry has registered 29 deaths, Chhattisgarh 25, Goa 23, Chandigarh 12, Himachal Pradesh 11, Tripura seven, Meghalaya four, Arunachal Pradesh three, Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu and Ladakh have reported two fatalities each.

The health ministry stressed that more than 70 per cent of the deaths occurred due to co-morbidities.

Maharashtra has reported the highest number of cases at 3,18,695 followed by Tamil Nadu at 1,75,678, Delhi at 1,23,747, Karnataka at 67,420, Andhra Pradesh at 53,724, Uttar Pradesh at 51,160, Gujarat at 49,353 and Telangana at 46,274.

The number of COVID-19 cases has gone up to 44,769 in West Bengal, 30,390 in Rajasthan, 27,646 in Bihar, 26,858 in Haryana, 25,382 in Assam and 23,310 in Madhya Pradesh.

Odisha has reported 18,110 infections, Jammu and Kashmir 14,650, Kerala  13,274, while Punjab has 10,510 cases.

A total of 5,756 people have been infected by the virus in Jharkhand, 5,561 in Chhattisgarh, 4,642 in Uttarakhand, 3,853 in Goa, 3,079 in Tripura, 2,092 in Puducherry, 1,925 in Manipur, 1,631 in Himachal Pradesh and 1,195 in Ladakh.

Nagaland has recorded 1,021 COVID-19 cases, Arunachal Pradesh 790 Chandigarh 737 and Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu together have reported 684 cases. Meghalaya has reported 466 cases and Sikkim 305 cases.

Mizoram has registered 297 infections so far, while Andaman and Nicobar Islands has recorded 207 cases.

In view of rising cases, West Bengal has decided to follow Uttar Pradesh’s strategy and announced complete lockdown for two days every week. Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, West Bengal, Assam, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Andhra Pradesh are the states that have reported 80% of the total new cases.

Health Economist Riju M. John said such single-day spikes are a “worrying trend” and if this trend continues it can put severe pressure on hospital infrastructure and potentially increase the mortality rates.

According to his calculations, the daily cases are expected to hit 60,000 to 65,000 by the second half of August. He added the daily growth rate of active cases has been growing steadily over the past two weeks and has now surpassed the growth of total cases.

Another Economist Prof Shamika Ravi said active cases are now growing at the rate of 4.1% which means India will have 7.8 lakh active cases by August 6. “Containment policy clearly failing in several states,” she said while adding Bihar infection growth is much faster at 10% than all India 4.1% and the deaths are faster too – 3.1 % compared to 2.4% all India.

She said Bihar is not testing enough. A central team is in Bihar to monitor the situation and assist the state government in disease management.

Delhi, which has shown an impressive recovery, now has a recovery rate close to 85 %, with active cases just 12 %. In Delhi, more than 50 % of all the infected persons are recovering in-home isolations.

AIIMS Director Dr Randeep Guleria said certain areas of the city have hit their peak in Covid-19 cases while some areas are yet to reach the peak. He added that there is not much evidence of community transmission happening at the national level but there are hotspots in different cities where there is a spike of cases and it is very likely that local community transmission in those areas is happening.

According to the Union Health Ministry, the case fatality rate in India continues to register a steady decline and has dropped to 2.46 per cent on Monday. Officials said India has one of the lowest case-fatality rates in the world.