Before Durga Puja, West Bengal has registered more than 3,000 new Covid cases a day. (Figurative)
New Delhi:
The sharp rise in daily COVID-19 cases in Kerala, Karnataka, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh and West Bengal has worried the central government, which has rushed high-level expert teams to help control the pandemic there.
Apart from the third most affected state in the country, Karnataka, none of these states have a significant share in the country’s overall coronavirus cases. However, there has been a sharp increase in new reported Covid infections, increased positivity rate, and low tests, except for Karnataka and Kerala.
The situation is especially worrying in West Bengal before Durga Puja. The state has been recording more than 3,000 new COVID-19 cases every day, the highest yet, for the past 5 days.
Kerala has also reported between 6,000 and 10,000 cases a day for the last month.
In an effort to help these states “strengthen containment, surveillance, testing, infection prevention and control measures and efficient clinical management of positive cases,” the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare has sent teams of experts, including a Nodal official joint secretary, medical and public health experts.
“The core teams will also guide in the effective management of challenges related to timely diagnosis and follow-up,” said a statement from the Ministry of Health.
Figures shared by the central government indicate the threat of Covid that could be under local populations before the winter months, when cases are expected to increase, in addition to the increase in other seasonal respiratory diseases.
According to government data, the percentage of active cases, or those receiving coronavirus treatment, against the state count was highest for Karnataka at 14.1%, followed by Kerala (11.8%). This figure is higher than the national average of 10.6% of active cases.
Although West Bengal, Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan have the lowest percentage of active cases, they have recorded the steepest percentage increase in daily cases for about a month.
Data shows that these states have a satisfactory recovery rate, but a high positivity rate (the proportion of people who test positive compared to those who are tested) indicates the spread of COVID-19.
Kerala has a positivity rate of 16.6 percent versus 53,518 tests per million, Karnataka’s is 11.5 percent for nearly 1 lakh of samples tested, and Chhattisgarh has a 10.4 percent positivity for nearly 50,000 testicles per million. Although West Bengal and Rajasthan have lower positivity rates, they are also running fewer Covid tests.
India’s average positivity rate is around 6 percent versus 9.4 percent a month ago.
The development comes as India’s overall active cases dropped below 8 lakh for the first time after 6 weeks thanks to a strong recovery rate, early detection with high tests, and other containment strategies.
India now has 74.3 lakh of cases with 1.1 lakh of deaths, the lowest number per million deaths from Covid in the world, government data shows.
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