Coronavirus India: 50 per cent deaths from above 60 population

The elderly, who make up 10 per cent of India's population, accounted for more than 50 per cent of Covid-19 deaths in the country, the government said on Tuesday. In addition, 73 per cent of Covid-19 deaths were among those with co-morbidities, the Ministry of Health said, arguing that India could handle Covid-19 care better than many other countries and minimize deaths.

Persons aged 60 to 74-8 % of the total population-accounted for 38% of Covid-19 deaths. Those aged 74 years, accounting for 2 per cent of the population, represented 12 per cent of total deaths.

The Center shared the report even as the novel death toll for coronavirus rose to 5,598 with 204 more deaths, while the overall number of infections rose to over 1,98 lakh in 8,171 new cases.

Joint secretary of the Health Ministry Lav Agarwal said it may not be enough to see India 's figures in isolation without taking into account the scale of the population and its death and infection rates per lakh or per million. He responded to the comment that the country had been the world's seventh-worst hit- “Our Covid-19 fatality rate of 2.82% is among the lowest in the world, compared to a global fatality rate of 6.13%. We have been able to achieve this due to timely identification of cases and proper clinical management,” Agarwal said.

The government also maintained that there was no under-reporting of Covid-19 deaths in India and states were carrying out causality assessment and as a result, attributing the cause of death.
An ICMR official said that not all deaths could be brought down to Covid-19 and that people who died in hospitals were evaluated in terms of their health.