Maharashtra, Mumbai, Pune Coronavirus Live Updates: Aurangabad reports 317 new cases, 13 deaths

Health Ministry says early detection, isolation, seamless hospitalisation of COVID patients made possible due to exponential hike in testing infrastructure.

Health Ministry says India's COVID-19 cases share is 17.7 per cent of global infections, while those who have recuperated are 19.5 per cent of total recoveries in world. India has highest number of recovered cases of COVID-19 in world at 44,97,867, the ministry added.

Rajesh Bhushan, Secretary, Union Health Ministry: "In the last four days, the daily recoveries have exceeded the new cases being reported."

"We get swayed by the narrative that India has over 50 lakh cases, but we forget that nearly 45 lakh people have already recovered."

Veteran actor Zarina Wahab was discharged from a city hospital on Sunday, five days after she tested positive for coronavirus, according to Dr Jalil Parkar.

The 61-year-old actor, best known for films "Chitchor", "Gharonda", "My Name is Khan" and "Dil Dhadakne Do", was admitted to Lilavati Hospital last week after complaints of fever and breathlessness.

"She was admitted last week, around September 14-15. She was COVID-19 positive. She had fever, breathlessness. I gave her all the treatment and after five days she became well and went home. She was discharged on Sunday," Dr Jalil Parkar, who treated Wahab, told PTI.

When asked if the actor had tested negative for the virus, Parkar said doctors can discharge patients if they're recovering from COVID-19. (PTI)

The Chaitanya Institute of Mental Health has opened after being closed for several months due to Covid-19. More than 200 patients, including staff, had tested Covid-19 positive at the institute. “At least 70 patients with dementia and Alzheimer’s disease were infected with Covid-19 and Dr Imran Shaikh and his wife, Sapna Shaikh, a psychiatrist with the team, took up the challenge to look after them,” Ronny George, founder of the institute working in the field of psychosocial rehabilitation, told The Indian Express.

“It was a devastating experience as about 50 per cent patients in the dementia care unit were affected by Covid-19,” he added.

The railway police arrested four leaders of the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS), including party general secretary Sandeep Deshpande, for defying Covid-19 orders. They had held a savinay kaydebhang (civil disobedience) protest on Monday, during which they boarded local trains demanding services be made available to ordinary people. Services are currently only available for people involved in essential services and government employees.

A case has been registered against the four leaders under IPC Sections 188 (disobedience to order duly promulgated by public servant) and 269 (negligent act likely to spread infection of disease dangerous to life), and the Disaster Management Act, the Indian Railways Act and other Covid-19 prevention measures of Maharashtra.

While the daily new detection of novel coronavirus cases has been hovering around the one lakh mark for the last two weeks, it is the number of recoveries that has actually crossed that figure now.

On Monday, more than 1.01 lakh Covid-19 patients were declared to have recovered from the disease, while the daily new detection fell sharply to 75,000. It is not unusual for the new cases to fall on a Monday. It is the result of the reduced number of tests that are carried out on a Sunday. This Sunday, the number of tests had gone down steeply. Only about 7.3 lakh samples were tested against the normal of about 11 to 12 lakh samples on other days.

But the recoveries have been showing a steady rise in the last few days, unaffected by the fluctuations in the detection of new cases. Usually, the number of recoveries tail the discovery of new cases by two weeks. That’s the normal recovery time for an infected person. But for several days now, the recoveries have been much more than new cases, possibly because some unaccounted recoveries from previous days are getting added up in the data being released by the state governments.

Two policemen posted in Navi Mumbai succumbed to Covid-19 on Monday, taking the death toll in the Maharashtra Police to 224. The deceased have been identified as Vinod Pasatkar (46) and Shantilal Koli (55). So far, nine Navi Mumbai police personnel have died after contracting the virus.

Constable Pasatkar was posted at the city police headquarters in Belapur and was admitted to the D Y Patil Hospital on September 7 after testing positive. An officer said Pasatkar was placed on ventilator support on Friday after his health deteriorated. His colleague, Koli, posted as an ASI at NRI police station, had also been battling the infection in hospital for the past week.

Mumbai and Thane are likely to receive heavy rain on Tuesday with the India Meteorological Department (IMD) issuing a red alert with a forecast of heavy to very heavy rainfall (between 64 mm to 204.4 mm in 24 hours) at isolated places.

The intensity of the rain is likely to reduce from Wednesday, with the weather bureau issuing a yellow alert for Mumbai.

Moderate to a few intense spells, accompanied by thunderstorm and lightning, hit parts of Mumbai and neighbouring areas on Monday evening. Between 5 pm and 7 pm, Bandra recorded 20.2 mm, Santacruz 16.6 mm, Ram Mandir 28.5 mm and Thane and Kalyan between 40 mm to 70 mm of rainfall.

Three days after the state health secretary wrote to all districts to judiciously use medical oxygen and hinted at possible pilferage, an uproar from the medical community forced the Maharashtra government to issue a clarification on Monday stating “there is no intention of state government to ration/ restrict consumption of oxygen by any patient”.

“Each patient should receive oxygen in the manner and to the level as may be necessary for full and speedy recovery,” the letter on Monday by Health Secretary Dr Pradeep Vyas said.

The state government was forced to issue a clarification after private doctors questioned its allegations of excessive oxygen usage and said a treating doctor has the right to decide the quantity of oxygen required for a patient. The government on Monday asked hospitals to work on minimising oxygen wastage until central guidelines on oxygen are issued. The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare conducted a meeting in New Delhi on Monday to formulate protocol on consumption and use of medical oxygen. The guidelines are expected soon.

Districts will soon have to rely more on rapid antigen tests as state laboratories inch close to the total capacity mark for real-time polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) tests and cases continue to surge in state. Presently the state conducts on an average 50,000 RT-PCR tests, it has a total capacity of handling around 80,000 of these tests each day.

Currently, of daily 90,000 tests Maharashtra is conducting, RT-PCR contributes to two-third (50,000) and rapid antigen tests accounts for one-third. State plans to notch up from 90,000 to 1.50 lakh tests per day in a few days. For that, half of tests will have to be rapid antigen as capacity for RT-PCR is 80,000 in 166 laboratories.

A shortage of testing kits has also put pressure on RT-PCR tests in multiple districts. In Beed, which can test 1,200 samples each day, a shortage of kits has forced the district to test only 200 samples per day and rely on rapid antigen for remaining samples. “The shortage has been since the last 20 days. ICMR is slowly stopping supply of kits, and the state is procuring on its own. We have asked state authority for kits,” a district health official said.

Welcome to our Maharashtra coronavirus LIVE blog. The state recorded 15,738 new cases on Monday, pushing the total count of infections in the state to 12,24,380. With 344 people succumbing to the infection, the cumulative toll crossed the 33,000 mark and reached 33,015. The state now has 2,74,623 active cases.