New Delhi: Covid-cases in Delhi surged to a new high on Friday even as a concerned home ministry has called for a meeting on Monday to discuss the issue. For the fourth day in a row, new Covid-19 infections in Delhi on Friday set yet another single-day record even as the positivity rate continued to rise at alarming levels with a tenth of all tests in the past 24 hours returning positive results, highlighting what is clearly the third and worst wave yet of the outbreak in the Capital.
New Delhi: Covid-cases in Delhi surged to a new high on Friday even as a concerned home ministry has called for a meeting on Monday to discuss the issue. For the fourth day in a row, new Covid-19 infections in Delhi on Friday set yet another single-day record even as the positivity rate continued to rise at alarming levels with a tenth of all tests in the past 24 hours returning positive results, highlighting what is clearly the third and worst wave yet of the outbreak in the Capital.
Worried about the continuous spike in Delhi’s infections during the ongoing festive season, and at the start of winter, the Union home ministry has called a special review meeting with Delhi government officials on Monday to check the spiralling rate of Covid-19 cases in the Capital, people familiar with the matter told HT. The meeting, chaired by Union home secretary Ajay Bhalla, will take stock of the situation and suggest concrete steps to the Delhi government to address the issue. Apart from Bhalla, Union health secretary Rajesh Bhushan, Niti Aayog member Dr VK Paul, and other senior central officials will interact with Delhi health officials, the people cited above added.
This will be the second intervention by the Centre into rising Covid cases in Delhi. In July, Union home minister Amit Shah held a round of meetings with Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal and other officials after which, testing, contact tracing and sero-surveillance were ramped up in Delhi with the two governments working in coordination. Delhi government spokespersons did not respond to messages and calls seeking comment on the matter.
Cases in Delhi have risen to unprecedented highs in the past week. With 5,891 new cases on Friday, Delhi set a new record for the highest single-day new infections for the fourth day in a row, pushing the total number of cases to 381,644.
On average, Delhi has reported 4,749 cases every day in the past week, which means that the current trajectory is far above the peak of what is considered the second wave (4,174 average cases reported for week ending September 17). In contrast, cases in the rest of the country have steadily declined through at least the past month, making Delhi one of the only two regions (besides West Bengal) currently witnessing a peak. What is alarming experts, though, is the rise in the Union territory’s positivity rate. The seven-day average of positivity rate has risen more than 3.5 percentage points in just three weeks – from 5.3% for the week ending October 8 to 8.8% on Thursday.
Experts stressed the need for the Delhi government to further increase testing and said that a fast-rising positivity rate is an indicator that a region is not testing adequately. “Delhi is witnessing a severe spike in cases for the third time. A specific study should be conducted in the city at this juncture. There are also studies that suggest that air pollution contributes to transmission of the virus. That makes the situation in Delhi much worse. The number of tests being conducted needs to be further scaled up,” said Dr Jacob John, former head of clinical virology department at Christian Medical College in Tamil Nadu’s Vellore.
