MP saw more Covid cases in September than first 5 months of outbreak combined - Hindustan Times
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MP saw more Covid cases in September than first 5 months of outbreak combined

Hindustan Times, Bhopal | ByRanjan | Edited by Abhinav Sahay
Oct 02, 2020 09:08 AM IST

40% of all Covid patients’ deaths recorded so far in the state were registered in the month of September.

Madhya Pradesh registered more Covid-19 cases in the month of September than were recorded in the first five months of coronavirus outbreak. In September, it also recorded as many as 40% of all Covid-19 deaths in the state, as per the health department’s Covid bulletins.

Madhya Pradesh: Coronavirus positive patients being discharged from Chirayu medical college and hospital n Bhopal .(ANI Photo)
Madhya Pradesh: Coronavirus positive patients being discharged from Chirayu medical college and hospital n Bhopal .(ANI Photo)

As on Wednesday, the Covid-19 cases tally stood at 128,047 with 2,316 deaths and the recovery of 104,734 patients from the disease since March 20 onwards. The Covid-19 tests tally stood at 2,035,134. The first Covid-19 case was reported in Madhya Pradesh from Jabalpur on March 20.

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As many as 64,082 Covid cases were reported from across the state in the month of September alone, whereas, 63,965 Covid cases had been reported between March 20 and August 31—a period of more than five months.

Similarly, 922 Covid-19 patients died in September against 1,394 deaths recorded in the period from March 20 to August 31.

As per the official data, on an average, one Covid case was reported every less than 4 minutes from across the state between March and August, whereas in September, three Covid cases were reported every two minutes, thus registering an increase of 469%. Similarly, between March and August, death of a Covid patient was reported every 170 minutes on an average, whereas in September, a death due to Covid-19 was reported almost every 47 minutes.

Also Read: At least 14 states have less than 5,000 active Covid-19 cases each: Health ministry

There was an increase in positivity rate too, which varied from day to day. For instance, in the last five days of August, the positivity rates were recorded at 5.5%, 4.8%, 5.3%, 6.2% and 5.5% respectively. The same on the last five days of September stood at 10%, 12.2%, 9%, 10% and 8.6%.

However, if the number of cases, deaths and positivity rates increased alarmingly in September, so did the number of those who recovered from the disease across the state. The recoveries rose from 48,657 registered between March and August to 56,077 in September alone. Thus, on an average, one Covid patient recovered from the disease every less than 5 minutes in the six months period between March and August, while more than six patients recovered every 5 minutes in September as Covid cases went up significantly.

More than 6.57 lakhs tests were conducted in September that accounted for less than 50% of the total tests conducted between March and August. Madhya Pradesh lags behind several states on the number of tests conducted per million of the population, as per health department officials.

As per the health bulletin released on Wednesday night, MP had conducted 28,032 Covid-19 tests per million.

Public health experts find the state government’s current handling of the Covid-19 situation worrying and disappointing.

“Apart from the government data which lacks transparency, more worrying is the fact that the government seems to have withdrawn itself from its responsibility to control the Covid situation. The government authorities are repeatedly attributing a significant increase in Covid cases to people moving around during Unlock whereas huge gatherings are witnessed in almost every political meeting ahead of bypolls in the state,” said Amulya Nidhi, a public health expert.

Also Read: MP pharma factory murder: Police make 3 more arrests

Another public health expert SR Azad said, “Till now the government has not made public its death audit report. There is no data available on patients and deaths hospital wise. There is no response to the growing number of complaints from the Covid patients and their relatives and till now there is no aggressive strategy to control the situation.”

Despite efforts, additional chief secretary, health department, Mohd Suleman, couldn’t be reached for comments.

However, on Thursday, chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan said, “There is a constant improvement in the Covid situation across the state. While the recovery rate has gone up to 82.5%, the number of active cases is coming down constantly. The number of active cases had reduced by 2000 in the past 4 days. The death rate too, has come down significantly. In the past 15 days, the death rate was 1% while the overall death rate is 1.08%.”

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