Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal has called an “Urgent” meeting with the Health Minister and other officials, his office said, as the city reported 2,790 new Covid cases on Thursday – its most highly day by day figure this year – alongside nine passings in the midst of a spurt in COVID-19 virus in the nation.
The city had logged 1,819 cases a day ago, making Thursday’s jump a huge 53 per cent.
“CM office to hold an urgent meeting at 4 pm tomorrow (Friday), Health Minister Satyendar Jain and other department officials to remain present,” said a statement from the Chief Minister’s office.
The chief minister will think on setting up an action plan to fight the pandemic, including issues like number of containment zones, vaccination drive, and essential availability of clinic beds, it said.
“The chief minister is keeping a close eye on the situation in Delhi, and is ensuring a daily review by receiving regular updates from the officials,” it said.
As indicated by orders given by Mr Kejriwal, the health department has expanded its vigilance measures and in 33 private hospitals, there has been an increment of 25% in the quantity of ICU beds just as those in the normal wards.
Cases have been on the rise in India since early February – when new every day diseases dropped under 9,000 – to more than 72,000 on Thursday, the most significant level since October.
experts have warned that infections are increasing at a faster speed compared with a year ago, when single-day cases peaked at just about 1 lakh in September.
The state worst hit by the virus has been Maharashtra, home to the country’s financial capital Mumbai.
The country’s health secretary obtusely advised the 28 states on Tuesday to take a few to get back some composure on remiss Covid counteraction measures “right now” to prevent healthcare systems being overwhelmed by a surge in infections.
India’s current caseload of 1.22 crore positions third behind just the United States and Brazil, with testing unfit to stay aware of demand. The daily rise in cases has quadrupled in the space of a month.
“The current rise in cases … has the potential of overwhelming healthcare systems unless checked right now,” Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan said in a letter to the states.
“Many districts in the country are seeing clusters of cases emerging because of specific events and/or places where crowding happens, or where a large number of people are in close contact coupled with a lack of a COVID-appropriate behaviour,” he said.
Despite the warnings, top politicians including Prime Minister Narendra Modi himself have been addressing rallies and meetings of tens of thousands of people, sitting or standing shoulder-to-shoulder, with only a handful wearing masks.
Multi-phase elections in West Bengal, Assam, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Puducherry started a week ago and will go through one month from now.
Vinod Kumar Paul, a senior government health official, told a news conference the situation across India was going “from bad to worse”.
