There is much that Delhi has done right over the last month.
About a month ago, Delhi surpassed Mumbai as the Indian city with the highest number of COVID-19 cases. The capital recorded in excess of 2,000 cases daily for more than five weeks in June and July. The Delhi government apprehended that the city’s caseload would cross 5 lakh by the end of July and there were fears of the healthcare system being overwhelmed by the surging virus. Since then, the Delhi government has ramped up testing and bolstered the city’s medical infrastructure. The measures have led to an appreciable fall in the city’s daily caseload in the past 10 days. On Monday, the capital recorded less than 1,000 cases in 24 hours for the first time since June 1. This is a heartening development. However, given the unpredictable ways of the coronavirus, the Delhi government and the city’s residents cannot afford to let down their guard.
There is much that Delhi has done right over the last month. It has dedicated more than 15,000 beds in the city’s hospitals to COVID patients and increased critical care facilities. The Delhi government also put in place a home quarantine system for patients with mild symptoms and asymptomatic carriers of the virus. People recovering at home are given oximeters to help them monitor any dip in oxygen levels and their condition is monitored. These are significant interventions. It is well-known that more than 80 per cent of COVID patients do not require hospitalisation. But the fear of being moved to a quarantine centre had reportedly deterred many with COVID symptoms from getting themselves tested till the infection became severe. The assurance of recuperation at home led more people to get themselves tested — the number of tests has gone up nearly four times since the first week of June. There, however, remains more scope to increase testing facilities. Last week, for instance, the Delhi High Court pulled up the Indian Council of Medical Research for giving 26 private labs one month, a period it felt was “too long”, to upgrade their facilities for COVID testing.
The increase in testing in Delhi is driven largely by Rapid Antigen Tests, which deliver results in less than 30 minutes. But the possibility of false negatives is significantly higher in such tests compared to the swab test. According to figures presented by the Delhi government in the High Court, only one in 200 of those who tested negative in antigen tests was asked to undergo a swab test. The government maintains that it is going by the ICMR’s protocols which prescribe re-tests only for patients with symptoms. Given the constraint on resources, it would, of course, be impossible to follow up every negative antigen test with a swab test. Yet the results of these quick tests should not lull the Delhi government into complacency — especially because of the virus’s propensity to spread through asymptomatic carriers. A serological survey by the Union Health Ministry, released on Tuesday — which showed that about 24 per cent of the participants had developed antibodies — has also indicated that a large number of infected people in Delhi are asymptomatic. The reasons for Delhi’s healthcare system to be on high alert remain compelling.