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PM reviews Covid-19 situation as India logs over 260k cases
Saturday was the sixth day in a row that India recorded the highest single-day spike in infections.
India on Saturday reported more than a quarter million new infections of Covid-19 as nearly 1,500 people lost their lives to the viral disease – both numbers the highest-ever recorded in the country — a development that came on a day Prime Minister Narendra Modi held a review meeting with top officials and directed them to ensure real-time supply management to states “urgently”.
The devastating expansion of the outbreak continues to overwhelm the health infrastructure, and cremation and burial grounds in most states in the country. A total of 260,813 new cases were reported across the country on Saturday, taking the total number of confirmed infections to 14.78 million.
A record 1,496 new fatalities were lodged, taking the national death toll to 177,192, according to HT’s Covid-19 dashboard.
In a meeting with the cabinet secretary and secretaries of pharma and home, Modi was given a briefing on increased production capacity of life-saving drugs amid the second wave. “The Prime Minister directed that use of Remdesivir and other medicines must be in accordance with approved medical guidelines, and that their misuse and black marketing must be strictly curbed,” said an official statement.
The PM reviewed the availability and supply of ventilators, oxygen and medicines and called for utilising the entire national capacity across private and public sectors to produce vaccines.
The officials said that manufacturing of Remdesivir has been ramped up to provide about 7.4 million vials per month in May, while normal production output in January-February was just 2.7-2.9 million vials per month. “Supplies have increased from 67,900 vials on 11th April going up to over 2,06,000 vials on 15th April 2021 which are being particularly focused on states with high caseload and high demand,” said the statement.
The statistics surrounding the outbreak are alarming. Daily cases in India crossed 150,000 for the first time last Saturday – this means it took only one week for the country to start reporting an additional 100,000 cases.
While the PM spoke about the “need to utilise the full potential of India’s pharmaceutical industry to meet the rising demand of various medicines”, he said that there was no substitute the testing, tracking and treatment. “Early testing and proper tracking Remains key to reduce mortality and local administrations need to be proactive and sensitive to people’s concerns.”
The PM also asked for ensuring coordination with states and all necessary measures to ramp up the availability of hospital beds for Covid-19 patients and that the latter can be achieved through additional supply of beds through temporary hospitals and isolation centres.
Modi said that installation of approved medical oxygen plants should be sped up.
“162 PSA Oxygen plants are being installed in 32 States/UTs from PM CARES. The officers informed that 1 lakh cylinders are being procured & they will be supplied to states soon,” said the statement.
Saturday was the sixth day in a row that India set a new record for the most new cases reported in a day.
In the last two weeks, there were only two days that the country’s daily case tally did not break an all-time record – April 5 and April 12, both Mondays, which see daily numbers drop due to low testing the day before (Sunday).
The daily average of 203,881 cases registered over the last week was also a record, and was more than twice what India reported during the worst of the first wave in the country – the seven-day average of daily cases peaked at 93,617 for the week ending September 16, 2020, during the first wave.
With HTC inputs in New Delhi
