Mumbai, MMR seem to have crossed third wave peak, says health dept

Mumbai on Sunday reported the lowest, 2,550, Covid-19 cases since in last three weeks or 23 days of January

Mumbai: In what could be a relief for Mumbai, its surrounding areas, the Maharashtra health department officials said that the city, Thane, Raigad, and Palghar may have crossed the peak of the third wave of Covid-19. The health department officials said that the situation in Maharashtra could be stabilising with the third wave crossing the peak in the densely populated urban areas. However, with other areas still to hit the peak, any laxity could overturn the trend, they cautioned.

The health department officials said that the situation in Maharashtra could be stabilising with the third wave crossing the peak in the densely populated urban areas (HT)

Mumbai on Sunday reported the lowest, 2,550, Covid-19 cases since in last three weeks or 23 days of January. Further, the city also repsaw the drop in the daily positivity rate to 5.54%, the lowest in the last three weeks. The hospitalisation rate too has come down to 10.765 from 21% two weeks ago.

Maharashtra recorded its lowest single-day increase in Covid-19 cases since January 17 as it added 28,286. Monday’s dip in the cases can be attributed to a drop in the number of tests conducted in the last 24 hours. In the last 24 hours, the state tested 141,949 samples and had a positivity rate of 19.92%. The state daily average tests are around 190,000-200,000.

Mumbai, meanwhile, added 1,857 fresh Covid-19 cases--its lowest single-day tally since December 28, 2021. The city also reported 11 deaths. Mumbai’s active cases stood at 16,546.

According to the data, Mumbai, Thane, Palghar, Raigad, Pune districts have reported a substantial number of Covid cases in the third wave so far. In January alone, the health department’s data showed that these districts have a 37.44% increase in their cases. The data also showed that other districts too have seen an increase in daily cases from the previous month.

Dr Pradeep Vyas, additional chief secretary (health), said, “Mumbai, Palghar, Raigad and Thane seems to have crossed the peak. Pune will peak in seven days or so. While other districts are expected to peak at different times, so we are keeping a close watch.”

A senior health department official added that the situation could be stabilising as key urban centres which have a dense population and high mobility have peaked out. “The rural and semi-urban areas of the state are seeing cases, but there is no surge that we saw in Mumbai, Pune earlier this month. So largely we are stabilising. but we need to remain cautious,” he said.

The rural and semi-urban areas of the state are reporting more cases as the Omicron variant spreads to other parts, officials said. Vyas added that about 45% of samples tested in genome sequencing in the state showed the Omicron variant’s dominance and the rest are Delta variant. He added that the proportion varies between districts.

Dr Rahul Pandit, a member of the state Covid task force, too maintained a cautious stand on the overall Covid situation in the state. He said, “Some districts such as Mumbai, MMR, etc have stabilised but it is early to say that the wave has stabilised across the state.”

Meanwhile, Maharashtra reported 86 new cases of Omicron variant, taking the total tally to 2845. Out of these, 1,454 have been discharged following a negative RT-PCR test. Of the new cases reported on Friday, 47 were from Nagpur, 28 from Pune city, three from Pimpri-Chinchwad, two from Wardha and one each from Mumbai, Amravati, Yavatmal, Bhandara, Thane city, and Pune rural.