80,000 Covid-19 cases by June-end? BMC says can’t predict peak yet

Officials say impact of ‘Mission Begin Again’ will be known in a week; experts say need to boost infra

The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) is anticipating 80,000 Covid-19 cases in the city by the end of June, if the current pace of growth continues over the next 12 days. The civic body expects the impact of relaxations announced on June 3, as part of the Maharashtra government’s ‘Mission Begin Again’, to be seen in a week.

Health workers conducting COVID-19 test at Dharavi, during a government-imposed nationwide lockdown as a preventive measure against the spread of the coronavirus in Mumbai. (Satyabrata Tripathy/HT Photo)

Under ‘Mission Begin Again’, the state relaxed several restrictions even in red zones such as Mumbai, allowing non-essential shops, private offices (10% of its strength) to open, besides permitting Mumbaiites to step out for physical exercise by opening public gardens and beaches.

Last week, HT had reported the civic body was preparing for the “worst case scenario of Mumbai breaching the one-lakh-case mark by June-end” by ramping up crucial medical infrastructure such as beds and ventilators.

Suresh Kakani, additional municipal commissioner of BMC, said, “We have stabilised the number of cases since May 16 or 17, when we started getting over 1,000 cases daily. In the past one month, our one-day tally did not cross 1,700 or 1,800. The numbers have stabilised for now, but we can’t estimate the peak or saturation point. We will have to wait for one more week.”

Senior civic officials said assuming 1,500 cases are reported in the city daily for another 12 days, there will be 19,500 additional cases by the end of the month. This brings the estimated total to around 81,000 cases. If this pace continues, Mumbai could breach the one lakh mark by July.

However, Kakani said: “Although two weeks have passed since June 3, when we announced relaxations, there was rainfall and high alert advisory issued owing to cyclone Nisarga in the initial period, due to which people were home. Assuming people started venturing out from June 8, we have crossed the 10-day period of relaxation. We will have to wait for another one week to understand the impact of relaxation or to make any further estimation.”

BMC had last week claimed it was boosting medical facilities to handle around one lakh cases, of which over 58,000 were expected to be active, by June-end. According to BMC’s data, the occupancy rate as of Wednesday is 69% for beds, 96% for ICU beds, and 97% for ventilators.

Dr Siddarth Paliwal, a city-based private health consultant, said, “In the past one month, the capacity of our medical infrastructure has doubled, and the cases have risen from around 15,000-20,000 to 60,000. However, we will have to scale it up at a much faster rate, if we are of the belief that the peak has yet not arrived.”

Paliwal said, “On any given day, the occupancy rate for ICU beds and ventilators is above 90%. This is a good sign, considering earlier there were a lot of complaints of non-availability of beds. To handle one lakh cases, our health infrastructure will have to be scaled up by around 60-80%.”

BMC has so far conducted 2.69 lakh tests and is conducting 4,500-5,000 tests daily, said Kakani. “In the past one week, we have touched the 5,000 mark twice, on June 12 and June 16. We have the capacity to conduct around 7,000-8,000 tests daily,” he said.

The civic body has also set up 412 clinics and screened 25,000 people, of which around 10,000 were screened in 90 fever clinics that were set up in the past one month. BMC officials said they have concentrated on areas with high growth rate in the western suburbs, instead of just focusing on hotspots such as Dharavi, Worli, Mankhurd and Govandi.

Dharavi, one of the critical hotspots in Mumbai which is showing signs of improvement, reported only 17 cases and one death on Wednesday, taking the total to 2,106 cases and 78 deaths. Kiran Dighavkar, additional municipal commissioner of G-North ward, which covers Dharavi, said, “We have screened over six lakh citizens in Dharavi until now and are continuing with it. We have set up several fever clinics in Dharavi and also taken help of private clinics.”

BMC, in a statement on Thursday, said it was making arrangements of 2.08 lakh litres of oxygen across 20 hospitals to treat patients with respiratory issues.