Officials argued that the recovery rate was higher in some districts because cases were reported early, affording more time for recovery. (Express photo by Bhupendra Rana)

More than 80 per cent of the coronavirus positive patients in three of the five worst affected districts in Uttar Pradesh have been discharged from hospitals after their recovery. These districts are Kanpur Nagar, Agra and Lucknow. The state average is just 56.44 per cent.

The glimmer of hope emerges at a time when a large number of recent cases have been linked to returning migrant labourers and the doubling rate of cases is faster.

Officials argued that the recovery rate was higher in some districts because cases were reported early, affording more time for recovery. Other reasons were patients’ age and diet.

Kanpur Nagar has emerged with the best recovery rate at 91.46 percent in the state. The district has recorded 328 cases. Of them, 300 have been declared recovered and 11 died, leaving only 17 active cases.

In Agra, by far the most affected district, the recovery rate has reached at 85.29 per cent. Out of the total 850 positive patients, 725 have been discharged. With 33 deaths (the highest in the state), active cases remain at 92.

In Lucknow, the recovery rate is at 80.73 per cent with 264 of the total 327 positive cases discharged. Lucknow has recorded only two deaths.

The three districts were earlier declared hotspots. While most of the cases in Agra were caused by medical infection, mainly from one Paras Hospital, it was Sadar area in Lucknow where a huge number of Tablighi Jamaat members and their contacts were tested positive.

Similarly, in Kanpur Nagar, close to half of the cases were linked to students from different madrasas.

Meanwhile, the other districts in the list of top five affected districts are Noida with 66.09 per cent recovery rate and Meerut with 65.51 per cent.

According to state authorities, there is a high recovery rate in these district because they recorded most cases in the earlier phases, providing enough time for the patients to recover from the infection.

As per the data collected by The Indian Express, Kanpur has recorded only 16 cases in the last 10 days, Lucknow 56 new cases and Agra 65.

At the same time, Noida and Meerut have recorded 102 and 91 new cases respectively in the same period.

Talking to The Indian Express, Kanpur Chief Medical Officer (CMO) Dr Ashok Shukla said that their focus on patients’ diet and the fact that almost half of the patients were young worked in their favour.

He added that strict surveillance helped them track suspects.

“Our biggest focus was on the diet of patients and even though we got limited supply from the government, we provided heavy and healthy diet to patients. The same diet — including fruits and nutritious vegetables — is provided to doctors and special groups. This supposedly boosted immunity of patients. Another important thing was mental counselling of patients. Initially we got a very high number of Tablighi Jamaat members (around 180 Tablighis and their contacts) as positive cases and they were in agony. We had to cool them down and convince that we are here to help them. Soon they started trusting in the system,” said Shukla.

“In our district, the core team — consisting the DM, the SSP and I — discussed the plan in detail and we got a lot of support both from the police department and the medical teams. We worked on the field and with better coordination and were able to up our surveillance game. Even though increasing the total number of cases, this helped us stop the further spread. Once the number of new cases reduced, we had the luxury to focus on the active cases and their recovery,” he added.

In Kanpur, 48 per cent of the total cases were children below the age of 18 years — most were students of different madrasas in the district. Middle aged patients formed the second largest group.

Other than Lala Lajpat Rai (Hallet) Hospital, ESI Hospital and Rama Hospital were the main Covid treatment facilities for Kanpur patients.