Centre rushes high level multi-disciplinary public health teams to Maharashtra and Punjab
New Delhi: While Maharashtra, Kerala, Punjab, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu continue to report a high number of COVID daily new cases and cumulatively account for 82% of the 18,327 new cases reported in the past 24 hours in the country, at least eight more states are now displaying an upward trajectory in daily new cases.
In all 108 deaths were reported in the last 24 hours and six States accounted for 85.2%of the new deaths. Maharashtra saw the maximum casualties (53). Kerala followed with 16 daily deaths and Punjab reported 11 deaths in the last 24 hours.
As far as daily new cases were concerned, Maharashtra reported the highest daily new cases at 10,216, followed by Kerala, 2,776, and Punjab, 808 new cases.
With Haryana, Andhra Pradesh, Odisha, Goa, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand Delhi and Chandigarh also witnessing an increased number of daily positive cases, Union Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan, and Dr. Vinod K. Paul, Member (Health), NITI Aayog today interacted with Health Secretaries and MDs (NHM) of these states and Union Territories. In a detailed presentation, it was pointed out that 9 districts in Delhi, 15 in Haryana, 10 in Andhra Pradesh, 10 in Odisha, 9 in Himachal Pradesh, 7 in Uttarakhand, 2 in Goa, 1 in Chandigarh continue to be of concern as these districts are seeing a decrease in total tests being conducted, low share of RT-PCR tests, increase in weekly positivity and low number of contact tracing of the COVID positive cases. These together can pose high risk of transmission to the neighbouring States and UTs.
The Central Government today also rushed high level multi-disciplinary public health teams to Maharashtra and Punjab in view of the increase in number of daily new COVID-19 cases being consistently reported by these States. They are being deployed to assist the State Health Departments in COVID-19 surveillance, control and containment measures.
Meanwhile, India’s total active caseload reached 1,80,304 today, which is 1.61% of India’s total positive cases. In all, 21 States/UTs have less than 1,000 active cases. Arunachal Pradesh reported only 3 active cases.
The graph below shows the change in active cases for States/UTs in the last 24 hours. Kerala, Chhattisgarh and Tamil Nadu show a reduction in the active cases in the last 24 hours. On the other hand, Maharashtra, Punjab, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat and Haryana display a rise in the active cases during the same time period.
More than 1.94 cr (1,94,97,704) vaccine doses have been administered through 3,57,478 sessions, as per the provisional report till 7 am today. As on Day-49 of the vaccination drive (5th March, 2021), total 14,92,201 vaccine doses were given. Out of which, 11,99,848 beneficiaries were vaccinated across 18,333 sessions for 1st dose (HCWs and FLWs) and 2,92,353 HCWs and FLWs received 2nd dose of vaccine.
Eighteen States/UTs have not reported any COVID19 deaths in the last 24 hours. These are Gujarat, West Bengal, Uttar Pradesh, Goa, Uttarakhand, Lakshadweep, Puducherry, Assam, Sikkim, Manipur, Ladakh (UT), Meghalaya, Arunachal Pradesh, Tripura, Nagaland, Mizoram, A&N Islands and D&D & D&N.
– global bihari bureau
