Maha Covid-19 tally goes past 400,000

Maharashtra on Wednesday breached a grim milestone of 400,000 Covid-19 cases on Wednesday, amid Mumbai and other neighbouring cities witnessing a fall in cases over

Maharashtra on Wednesday breached a grim milestone of 400,000 Covid-19 cases on Wednesday, amid Mumbai and other neighbouring cities witnessing a fall in cases over the past few days and authorities claiming that the state has reached the peak of the virus curve. With the addition of 9,211 new infections in the past 24 hours, the state tally went up to 400,651.

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It took Maharashtra 143 days to reach 400,000 cases, with the first 100,000 taking 96 days, while the latest took just 11 days. The second and third 100,000 took 22 and 14 days respectively.

The state has 1,46,129 active cases after the total of recovered patients went up to 239,755, taking the recovery rate to 59.84%, against the national rate of 64.24% as on Tuesday, according to data released by state health department.

The state reported 298 deaths in 24 hours for the second time in a week — highest single day spike —taking the toll to 144,63.

Of the new deaths, 60 were in Mumbai, 60 in Pune district (40 in Pune city, 10 each in Pune rural and Pimpri-Chinchwad), 15 in Kalyan-Dombivli and 13 each in Thane city and Thane rural. State’s case fatality rate (CFR) stood at 3.61%, against the national rate of 2.25% on Tuesday.

Pune city remained on the top of the chart in daily infections, with 1,458 cases in the past 24 hours.Mumbai’s tally touched 111,991 with the addition of 1,109 cases.

July has so far reported 225,890 cases, accounting for 56.38% of the total cases. Mumbai’s share in the state’s case tally was 27.95%. It was 33.35% when it breached 3 lakh cases and 41.61% when the state figures crossed 2 lakh cases. Mumbai accounted for 54.83% when state crossed its first 1 lakh cases.

While the state breached grim milestone of 4 lakh cases, its positivity rate has shown a steady drop and reached 19.32%. The positivity over the week (July 21-28) was 19.64%, down from 22.17% during July 15-21 and 23.88% during July 8-14.

“The improvement in the positivity rate is a good sign and will help us in moving fast towards flattening of the curve,” said state health minister Rajesh Tope.

“Steady fall in the positivity rate, despite the rise in the daily tests, indicates that we are moving in right direction in containing the virus spread. From just 13,000 tests a month ago, to more than 45,000 tests a day today, we have been ensuring that no suspected contact is left tracing. We have been tracing about nine contacts per positive patient, which earlier was just three.This would help us in bringing down the CFR and contain the spread effectively,” said a top government officer who did not want to be named.

Experts expect the flattening of the curve to begin in next few weeks after it reaches the peak by mid August. They however have a word of caution. “If there is no discipline of social distancing and wearing of mask, which I call social and mask vaccine, there could be reverse wave of the infection. Mumbai has certainly gone past the peak and MMR is on the verge of it, so will be the case of Pune. We may see a different trend in different cities and areas, but the plateau is expected in next couple of weeks,” said Dr Rahul Pandit, an intensivist and member of the state -appointed task force for critical patients.

Cases in MMR have witnessed a steady fall in its share in the state tally to 28.80% on Tuesday, from 35.57% in July 21 and 42.91% two weeks ago on July 14. According to state officials, following Mumbai, eight other municipal corporations in MMR have successfully contained the spread.

Kalyan-Dombivli was one of the worst hit cities in MMR two weeks ago. Its daily count of cases came down to 219 on Wednesday, from 661 on July 12. The city was one of the worst hit in MMR after Mumbai with positivity rate reaching more than 40% and doubling rate dropping to 15 days. “The positivity rate has come down to 21% in last couple of days, and doubling has reached 34 days with a recovery rate of 69%. This could be achieved through aggressive tracing of contact and their effective management through ward-level war-rooms. The patients are attended to within hours of the test reports we get from ICMR at 8.30am. We have 10 ambulances per ward and ramped up facilities of Covid centres and hospitals,” said Vijay Suryavanshi, commissioner, Kalyan Dombivli Municipal Corporation (KDMC).

The commissioner said that the city is past its peak and expect the virus curve to stabilise in next few days and then beginning of flattening of the curve in couple of weeks. “Central government’s projection of peak for KDMC was 535-560 cases, which was crossed 15 days ago and now we expect our daily tally to go below 200 cases a day,” he said.

Currently 888,623 people are in home quarantine, while 40,777 are under institutional quarantine in the state.