Low death rate, lower active cases: Why July was a better month for Gurgaon

Gurgaon: A substantial decrease in active cases, lower death rate and a three-time increase in testing from last month — July has given the Gurgaon health department ample reasons to heave a sigh of relief.
Ever since Gurgaon started seeing a sharp spike in the number of Covid patients in early June, the second week of July was the first time active cases came below 1,000 in the district. The figure saw a gradual rise in the middle of this month, before coming down again over the past three days.
The death rate, too, has decreased substantially in July. While Gurgaon reported 88 deaths related to Covid-19 in June, only 30 patients succumbed to the virus this month.
Apart from deaths, the district has also been adding a lower number of fresh Covid cases daily. In the first week of June, Gurgaon had been reporting more than 200 cases on an average daily. This continued for several weeks before the numbers came down towards the end of this month. In the last three days, daily Covid cases in the district have remained in double digits — 78 on Friday, 77 on Thursday and 91 on Wednesday.
What has come as huge relief for Gurgaon is that the recovery rate has been increasing gradually and active cases have come down to below 1,000 for the first time after several weeks. “We have managed to stabilise the growing number of cases and also keep the death rate low. But some areas are turning hotspots again. We are monitoring them closely,” said Virender Yadav, the chief medical officer.
Asked about active cases coming down, the CMO attributed it to increased testing and early tracing of contacts. “Targeted testing and better management of patients in home isolation have helped in faster recoveries. We have focused on specific areas while planning our containment strategies, which has also helped us in bringing down the number of active cases,” he added.
Apart from its containment strategies, the health department has also ramped up testing by more than three times. In June, Gurgaon had been testing an average of 5,185 samples every week, which increased to 17,265 this month. This is a significant rise, considering that the administration had been testing only 500 samples a week on an average in May. So far, the district has conducted over 1 lakh cases.
Many of the tests are being done with the rapid antigen method, which ensures results in less than an hour. “The health department has set up camps in various parts of the city for conducting tests daily. People with symptoms should come forward to get themselves tested. We have camps in all containment zones,” said Dr MP Singh, the nodal officer for containment zones in Gurgaon. These camps are moving to various parts of the city after regular intervals.