E-Paper
54 active Covid cases in Pune, lowest since start of pandemic
As we near the end of the year, the Covid-19 active cases are right now at the lowest as compared to the last two years
As we near the end of the year, the Covid-19 active cases are right now at the lowest as compared to the last two years. The active cases in Pune are less than 60 at present, as per the health department.
According to the state health department, the maximum active cases are reported from Mumbai and Thane together, followed by Pune district. The total number of active cases in Mumbai and Thane is 62 whereas Pune district has reported 54 active cases in the state. There are a total of 168 active cases in Maharashtra.
Active cases in Maharashtra increased from 32,225 on January 1 to 2,65,346 on January 16 this year during the third wave.
On Thursday, 27 new cases in the state were reported with one death across Maharashtra. The case fatality rate in the state is 1.82%.
Speaking about the threats of new variants, Dr Pradeep Awate, state surveillance officer said that with the threat of new variants, screening of international patients has started at the airports.
“On the background of the international scenario of Covid-19, screening of international passengers arriving at Mumbai, Pune and Nagpur airports has been started from December 24. All passengers are being thermally scanned and 2 % random samples are taken for Covid testing. All positive samples are referred for Whole Genome Sequencing (WGS),” said Dr Awate.
He added that so far 79,688 patients are screened and RT PCR of 1,466 patients have been done.
“Out of these 1,466 patients, out of these three RT PCR positive patients till date, one is from Pune and second from Goa and third is from Navi Mumbai,” said Dr Awate.
Health department officials also added that the overall hospitalisation is also low across the state.
As per officials, Pune district reported 12 new Covid cases on Thursday with no deaths.
Dr Rajesh Karyakarte, Maharashtra coordinator of genome sequencing, said that in the last set of genome sequencing the dominant variants were XBB recombinant and BA.2.75 variant of Omicron.
“The samples needed for genome sequencing are less as the overall testing has reduced. But we are sequencing all samples that we get to understand the variant situation. Right now, only XBB and BA.2.75 are dominant in the sequencing samples,” said Dr Karyakarte.
