Health Minister Satyendar Jain on Wednesday warned that daily COVID-19 cases could reach a new peak in the city and requested people to wear masks and follow social distancing measures.
“Cases have increased a lot in Delhi in the past few days. Everyone knows that the best way to beat the virus is to wear masks and follow social distancing. Please wear masks. I appeal to everyone,” Mr. Jain said.
“Daily cases have gone above 5,000. The way cases are increasing, it could break the old record [of cases],” the Minister added.
Meanwhile, the surge in COVID-19 cases continued in the national capital with 5,506 new cases being reported in the last 24 hours — the highest in more than four months. The total number of cases stood at 6,90,568, according to a health bulletin released by the Delhi government.
The last time more cases were reported was on November 24, when 6,224 cases were reported in a day.
Twenty deaths were also reported in the past 24 hours, taking the total number of deaths to 11,133. A total of 90,201 tests were done in a day, the bulletin said. Of the total cases, 6,59,980 people have recovered and there are 19,455 active cases.
The highest number of daily new cases reported in Delhi since the beginning of the pandemic is 8,593 cases on November 11. After the peak in November, the number of cases had gradually decreased. New cases were falling in early 2021 and on January 16, the number of daily new cases had dropped to 94. But it slowly increased to 200 on February 24 and it has been on the rise since.
Mr. Jain also said that the night curfew has been imposed as the government had received reports that a lot of parties were happening. “At parties, people come into close contact and we want to avoid it,” he said.
He said that Delhi’s positivity rate is still lower than other States and the government is focusing on containing it further.
New trend
“The new trend shows that people between 20 and 45 years are getting infected as they are more mobile. It seems that they are not heavily affected but the chances of the virus spreading increases when they go home, as their parents and other family members are exposed to risk. Therefore, we said that the vaccination should be rolled out to everyone barring age, as soon as possible,” Mr. Jain said.
A total of 41,412 beneficiaries took the COVID-19 vaccination in the city till 6 p.m. on Wednesday.