Manas Dasgupta
NEW DELHI, Jan 1: As the world is reporting the highest ever Covid surge in the last few days, India entering into another Coronavirus year is back to the drawing board to plan for the exigencies.
Even as for the first time young generation in the 15-18 age group started registering on the Co-Win platform for vaccination for the group starting from Monday, the centre wrote to all the states and union territories asking them to take immediate stock of their healthcare infrastructure.
Most of the instructions issued would take the states and UTs back to the deadly second wave situation requiring the concerned authorities to add more beds to hospitals, ramping up health care facilities, checking their oxygen availability and build up other infrastructure on a note of caution.
The centres’s concern was based on the fact that India logged 16,764 cases on Friday and on the very first day of 2022, the country reported 22,775 new Covid-19 cases and 406 deaths, more than 37 per cent increase, and the highest single-day rise since October 6.The number of Omicron infections also went up to 1,431, as on Saturday. The Omicron variant has now spread to 23 states in India. Maharashtra is the worst-affected state with 454 cases, followed by Delhi with 351 infections.
Omicron, the newest variant of SARS-CoV-2, is believed to be spreading very fast though the severity is not worrying as most Omicron patients are asymptomatic and are recovering without being hospitalised. But if patients are not isolated properly, there is an increased risk of transmission among other family members.
The number of active cases has now risen to 1,04,781, according to the Union Health Ministry data updated till 8 am on Saturday.
The 406 new fatalities include 353 from Kerala, 11 from Tamil Nadu and eight from Maharashtra. The death toll from the pandemic climbed to 4,81,080 with 406 new fatalities. The last time the country had more than 1 lakh active cases was on November 30.
The union health secretary Rajesh Bhushan in his letter on Saturday said, “In the context of the spread of Variant of Concern Omicron, the world is currently reporting the highest ever surge in Covid-19 cases. In India, the case trajectory is also showcasing an upward trend with 16,764 cases reported on December 31, the highest ever single-day rise in the past 70 days. Many developed nations in Europe and the Americas are reporting a significant rise in new cases in the past few weeks, which indicates high transmissibility of the virus.”
He cautioned that the health infrastructure may soon start getting stressed as there is a sudden increase in cases, the Centre said.
In view of this, the Centre has asked the states to create makeshift hospitals, utilise hotel accommodations for patients having mild to moderate symptoms, as it was done during the earlier surges in some states, it said.
To monitor patients under home isolation, the states should constitute special teams, call centres, control rooms. A clear focus on rural areas and pediatric cases must also be maintained, the letter said. “States need to regularly review the availability of required logistics, oxygen availability and buffer stick of drugs across all health facilities in the state,” the Centre said.
The active cases now comprise 0.30 per cent of the total infections, while the national Covid-19 recovery rate was recorded at 98.32 per cent, the health ministry said. An increase of 13,420 cases has been recorded in the active case count in a span of 24 hours. The daily positivity rate was recorded at 2.05 per cent while the weekly positivity rate was recorded at 1.10 per cent. The number of patients who have recuperated has gone up to 3,42,75,312, while the case fatality rate was recorded at 1.38 per cent.
The cumulative number of Covid vaccine doses administered in the country so far has exceeded 145 crore. Of the 4,81,486 Covid deaths reported so far in the country, 1,41,526 are from Maharashtra, 47,794 from Kerala, 38,335 from Karnataka, 36,776 from Tamil Nadu, 25,107 from Delhi, 22,915 from Uttar Pradesh and 19,764 from West Bengal. The health ministry added that more than 70 per cent of the deaths occurred due to comorbidities.
Meanwhile, India on Saturday opened the registration on the CoWin portal for Covid-19 vaccines for children between the age of 15 to 18. “If the children are safe, then the future of the country is safe. I request the family members to register the eligible children for vaccination,” Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya said. “Our figures are being reconciled with the Indian Council of Medical Research,” the ministry said on its website, adding that a state-wise distribution of the figures is subject to further verification and reconciliation. Mandaviya had on Friday said India has crossed the milestone of 145 crore Covid vaccinations. “My gratitude to our doctors, scientists, healthcare and frontline workers for displaying immense grit, determination & resolve in the challenging 2021 year,” he said in a tweet.
Meanwhile, Echoing the Health Ministry’s concerns, the latest report of the India Covid-19 tracker, developed by the University of Cambridge and UK’s National Institute of Economic and Social Research, shows the growth rate of new cases is of significant concern in 15 states. As on December 29, the reproduction number for Covid-19 has exceeded 1.2 in these states—Bihar, Chandigarh, Chhattisgarh, Delhi, Goa, Gujarat, Haryana, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Punjab, Rajasthan, Tripura, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal. Besides, the filtered growth rate of daily cases has exceeded 2.5% in two other states—Telangana and Uttarakhand.