Maharashtra crosses 20,000 Covid-19 cases with 1,165 new infections

Maharashtra reported its first Covid-19 case on March 9 and took nearly 53 days to reach the 10,000 mark. The next 10,000 cases were registered in just nine days.

Maharashtra reported 1,165 Covid-19 cases on Saturday to cross the 20,000 infection mark and also registered the highest single-day fatalities with 48 deaths. The state capital of Mumbai recorded 722 cases, taking the tally in India’s worst-affected city to 12,864.

A doctor ready to take swab sample of a resident during Covid-19 testing drive in Dharavi during a government-imposed nationwide lockdown as a preventive measure against the spread of the coronavirus disease. (Satish Bate/HT Photo)

The spike came on a day new commissioner of the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) Iqbal Singh Chahal said his two priorities are to minimise the number of coronavirus cases in Mumbai and have the city prepared for the upcoming monsoon season.

Chahal, an 1989 batch IAS officer, took charge late on Friday after the state government transferred previous BMC commissioner Parveen Pardeshi to the urban development department.

Maharashtra reported its first Covid-19 case on March 9 and took nearly 53 days to reach the 10,000 mark. The next 10,000 cases were registered in just nine days.

The state health department said 178 patients from the Mumbai Metropolitan Region were added to the Indian Council of Medical Research data of cases on its portal, but the reconciliation of the figures by the state was yet to be done. The state also stated that since the collection of data was a progressive process, so the numbers could vary.

Of the 48 deaths registered on Saturday, 27 were in Mumbai, nine in Pune and eight in Malegaon in Nashik district. Pune rural, Nanded, Akola and Amravati saw one death each. Twenty seven of the patients who died on Saturday were above 60 years of age, while 18 were in the age group of 40-59years. At least 28 of them had high-risk comorbidities.

The mortality rate in the state stood at 3.83%, down from 7.21% on April 12, but the number of deaths is increasing. The country’s mortality rate hovers around 3.32%. According to a report by the medical education and drugs department, the highest (21.91%) chunk of patients are between 21 and 30 years, followed by those in the 31 to 40 age group (21%).

The report also highlighted 73% of the fatalities had high-risk comorbidities like diabetes, hypertension and heart ailment, among others. At least 59% of patients found positive after their tests were asymptomatic.

Among the municipal corporations, Mumbai, Thane, Pune, Aurangbad, Navi Mumbai are the most affected cities. 86.48% of the total cases till Friday are from the Mumbai Metropolitan Region and Pune Metropolitan Region, which house roughly 30 % (35 million) of the state’s population..

The state government, which has hinted at an extension of the ongoing lockdown in MMR and PMR, has directed the municipal corporations in the worst-affected cities to concentrate on containment zones “We may extend some relaxations for the industries after third phase of lockdown ending on May 17 in the orange and green zones. Red zones too may have a brief relaxations outside the containment zones, but at the same time the implementation of the lockdown in containment zones would be stricter,” said a senior bureaucrat.

The number of tests in the state touched 227,804 on Saturday.