Record 1-day jump in Maharashtra cases for third day in a row

India’s worst-affected city, Mumbai, reported 1,190 new cases. Of the deaths reported on Saturday, 10 were in Jalgaon and six in Aurangabad, besides 136 in Mumbai.

For a third consecutive day, Maharashtra on Saturday recorded its highest 24-hour jump in coronavirus cases with 3,874 more infections, taking the tally to 128,205. Mumbai, the worst-affected Indian city, recorded its highest single-day spike in deaths with 136 fatalities, taking the toll to 3,561.

A health care worker checks the temperature in the Dharavi slums in Mumbai. (Satish Bate/HT Photo)

The state’s Covid-19 death toll also rose by 160, pushing the fatality count to 5,984 . According to the state, barring Mumbai, Thane, Raigad and Palghar districts, reconciliation of deaths in all districts/municipal corporations has been done.

India’s worst-affected city, Mumbai, reported 1,190 new cases. Of the deaths reported on Saturday, 10 were in Jalgaon and six in Aurangabad, besides 136 in Mumbai.

The state’s recovery rate is 50.04% as 64,153 patients are reported to have recovered so far, with 1,380 patients discharged on Saturday. The case fatality rate in the state stands at 4.67%.

State authorities, however, are wary about the rapid spread of the virus in some parts of the state, mainly because of the weak health infrastructure. Jalgaon and Solapur, where the cases have been rising rapidly in the past few weeks, the tracing and testing rate is poor.

In Solapur, according to government officials, the local administration has failed to trace the vulnerable people among beedi and textile workers, whose immunity is low because of their work profiles. This has led to a high case fatality rate in the district.

“We could contain the spread well in Mumbai, but the curve has been disturbed because of cases in other parts of the state. Chief minister Uddhav Thackeray has asked district collectors and civic chiefs to pull up their socks and contain the spread. The districts and municipal corporations are being monitored from state level,an official said.

Leader of Opposition and former chief minister Devendra Fadnavis has again pointed at the lack of transparency. In a letter written to Thackeray, he has stated that the case fatality rate in Mumbai is 5.27% and the city’s total caseload is 52.18% of the total state cases. He has also pointed at lapses in the health system and at a few hospitals and demanded to maintain transparency.

Mumbai’s case count, which was 61.37% on May 20, has dropped to 52.58% on Friday, while for Mumbai Metropolitan Region, it has come down to 73.85% on Friday from 76.40% on May 20. Mumbai accounted for 63.73% of the daily state cases on May 14, 56.47% on May 28, which dropped to 41.1% on June 17.

Dr Sanjay Oak, who heads a task-force of doctors constituted by the government for the clinical management of critically ill patients, said that they are going to focus on reducing the fatality rate. “We are not scared of positive cases as they can be controlled. We have controlled them in Mumbai. Early identification, treatment and application of the appropriate drugs is the key for the treatment. After introducing plasma therapy, use of tocilizumab, now we are pushing for remdesivir and other drugs that have proved useful in treating Covid-19. We will focus completely on reducing the CFR in the state. The idea of the field hospitals has paid off well as we are ready with adequate beds and ready to take up more patients,” he said.

He said that although the number of patients is on the rise, it is not a community spread of the disease and they now expect an undulating pattern of cases. “I would not say it as a peak, but there will be ups and downs in cases for the next few days, before the numbers start subsiding. One should understand that the virus would not completely go away, and the people have to be cautious while dealing with it,” Dr Oak said.

After the first infection was reported on March 9, the month saw 302 cases and 10 deaths, followed by 10,196 cases and 449 deaths in April. In May, 57,157 cases and 1,827 deaths were reported, while 56,676 cases and 3,607 deaths were reported in 20 days of June. The cases in June account for 45.58% of the total.

After a sudden jump of 1,328 fatalities, as a result of reconciliation of the data on Tuesday, the state case fatality rate has risen to 4.77%, much above the national rate. The state government, however, said that its recovery rate improved to 50.49% after 60,838 patients recovered. The state health department has also said that the doubling rate of cases has improved to 25.9 days on June 16, from 3.5 days on March 31 and 10.2 days on April 30 and 20.1 days on May 31. The weekly growth rate of cases has been 3% on June 16, from 12%, 7% and 4% on March 31, April 30 and May 31 respectively.

Meanwhile, Thackeray inaugurated the 100th testing laboratory for coronavirus at GT Hospital in Mumbai on Saturday. This has augmented the total daily capacity to 38,000 samples, including 20,500 in private laboratories.