Delhi sees 8 deaths, Mumbai 3 in 24 hours
Driven by huge spikes in Delhi, Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh, India’s Covid-19 surge turned alarming as the country registered 58,097 new coronavirus infections during the last 24 hours. This figure reported on Wednesday is the highest in 199 days, taking the country’s total tally of cases to 3,50,18,358, while the active cases were recorded above 2 lakh after around 81 days.
While Delhi and UP saw a two-fold rise in a day. Delhi registered 5,466 cases on Tuesday, which went up to 10,671 on Wednesday. Eight persons died of the virus in one day. Similarly, UP’s count went up from 999 to 2,038 during the same period.
Mumbai reported 15,166 fresh cases of Covid-19 on Wednesday, making it the highest daily count ever since the pandemic began. Three persons succumbed to the virus. The city also recorded 100 new cases of Omicron.
On the whole, Maharashtra reported 26,538 new cases, 8 deaths and 5,331 discharges in a day. Active cases rose to 87,505. Maharashtra’s Omicron count has now reached 797.
Delhi currently has 23,307 active cases, a health bulletin said. The national Capital has reported 464 cases of the Omicron variant so far.
“Testing has been intensified. Around 90,000 tests were conducted on Tuesday. A Covid war room has been activated which will help in maintaining district and hospital-wise data about bed occupancy, patients, oxygen, etc,” Delhi Health Minister Satyendra Jain said .
Apart from that, private hospitals have been instructed to increase the number of reserved beds for coronavirus patients to 40 percent.
While the number of patients in Delhi hospitals rose from 247 to 531 on Tuesday, the number of patients and oxygen support has also grown from 94 to 168 and ozone ventilators from four to 14 since January 1, 2022.
In UP, 2,038 more people have tested positive for novel coronavirus infection in the last 24 hours, almost 2 fold increase in cases since Tuesday when 992 cases were reported in one day.
Additional Chief Secretary (Medical and Health) Amit Mohan Prasad said that out of the 1,92,430 samples tested in the last 24 hours, 2,038 were positive for coronavirus infection. He said that in the last 24 hours, 51 Covid-19 patients had recovered.
He said in view of the increase in Covid-19 cases, the Government issued two guidelines. One, children can avail holiday on the day of vaccination and the next day, and the second guideline specifies that all educational institutions up to class 10 will be closed in the districts where there will be more than 1,000 active cases.
The official said that at present there were more than 1,000 active cases of Covid-19 only in Gautam Buddha Nagar while there were less than 10 active cases in 33 districts of the State.The night curfew will remain in force from 10 pm to 6 am on Thursday, he said.
Apart from this, people will be checked by setting up Covid Help Desk in zoos, memorials and other public places. Hotels, food points and cinema halls will operate with 50 per cent capacity.
Prasad said a new guideline had been issued by the Government of India regarding home isolation, according to which, the period of home isolation had been reduced to seven days. He said that the hospitalisation of new patients of COVID-19 was negligible.
“Testing and treatment of COVID-19 is being done free of cost at government centres. The coronavirus infection is not completely over yet. Therefore, people should follow Covid protocol. Be sure to follow the Covid protocol even after vaccination. In case of any problem, contact on Covid Helpline 18001805145, he said.
The countrywide scenario is equally grim. India has recorded more than 6.3 times increase in cases in the last 8 days to nearly touch 60 thousand infections on Wednesday itself.
India’s Omicron tally too went past the 2000-mark with 153 more cases taking the total number of patients to 2,043. The variant is now spread across 24 states and Union Territories in the country with fresh cases being recorded in Meghalaya.
The Health Ministry has identified Maharashtra, Delhi, West Bengal, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Jharkhand and Gujarat states as ‘emerging States of concern’ while it found that six states recorded more than 10,000 active cases and two states recorded between 5,000-10,000 cases.
Meanwhile, a total of 2,135 cases of Omicron variant of coronavirus have been detected across 24 States and UTs so far, out of which 828 have recovered or migrated, according to the Ministry data updated on Wednesday.
Omicron could soon become a dominant coronavirus strain in the country, completely replacing the Delta variant-responsible for first and second waves, the Government indicated on Wednesday as it said it is the predominant circulating strain in the cities in the country, hence mass gatherings should be avoided to lower the speed of this spread.
The Government, however, said there is no need to panic and one must be alert, disciplined and prepared, adding that the country will face this phase of the pandemic as well.” The upsurge of infections is happening in cities. Patients, as well as caregivers, should wear triple-layer masks or N-95 masks, “ said Joint Secretary (Health) Lav Aggarwal at a press briefing here on Wednesday.
He also pointed out that there has been a surge in Covid cases globally whereas 25.2 lakh cases were recorded globally on January 4, the highest ever since the onset of the pandemic.