Despite 6,000 new cases in 10 days, those needing beds are only 1,000; for same No. of cases in 2nd wave, 2,000 needed beds
A swab sample of a passenger taken at Dadar stn on Thursday. Pic/Ashish Raje
Covid cases in the city are rising with the infection rate increasing five times compared to the second wave in March and April this year. However, the authorities are not keen on a lockdown as the number of hospitalisations is almost half of the earlier wave.
To put things in perspective, in the past 10 days, from December 19 to 29, active cases increased by 6,000 and the number of patients in hospitals rose by 1,000. Whereas, during the onset of the second wave, it took a month for active cases to rise to the same level and the number of hospitalisations to 2,000.
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“More than 90 per cent of the patients have no symptoms at all. Less than five per cent patients are hospitalised and do not need oxygen or intensive care unit. The only issue is the growth rate which is very high as well as the doubling rate which is one or two days,” said Suresh Kakani, additional commissioner of the BMC.
A health worker collects the swab sample of a passenger at Lokmanya Tilak Terminus, Kurla on Thursday. Pic/Sameer Markande
He added that out of the 6,000 new cases added in the past week, only 280 needed hospitalisation. Out of 1,000 patients who were hospitalised, around 400 are international passengers who were quarantined and under surveillance. But will be discharged now after the negative report.
On December 19, the city had among the lowest active cases of 2021 with 1,948 active cases , of which 1,071 were symptomatic. Further, around 852 patients were hospitalised, of whom 141 were critical.
But the scenario changed within 10 days as active cases rose to 8,060 on December 29 with around 40 per cent of the patients showing mild symptoms. The number of hospitalisation has reached 1,873. The authorities, however, claim that many of the hospital admissions are for precautionary measures and the patients have foreign travel history.
In a somewhat similar situation during the second wave, active cases were the lowest on February 10 with 5,292 cases. The figure reached 11,379 over the next month on March 11. While the authorities got time to increase infrastructure during that period, it may not be the case this time around with cases doubling within a day or two.
40
Percentage of patients who are showing mild symptoms
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