India’s fight against the coronavirus pandemic is far from over as there are still several states and districts in the country that are reporting a high positivity rate despite the mega vaccination drive, the Union Health Ministry said on Thursday.
“The challenge of COVID has not ended yet. To some extent, we say that we haven’t controlled the second wave of COVID. We need to make continuous efforts,” Lav Agarwal, Joint Secretary with the Health Ministry, said at the weekly media briefing in New Delhi.
He warned that the next few months will be crucial for India amid emerging strains of the Covid-19 virus and the upcoming festival season.
“We need to be watchful of the months of October, November & December. We need to be alert. Avoid crowded places and unnecessary travel…explore online shopping. Stay at home and celebrate festivals virtually,” Agarwal said.
There are 28 districts in India, including a few in Arunachal Pradesh and Assam, which have case positivity rate between 5% and 10%.
“That is a high infection rate. There are 34 districts which are reporting weekly positivity rate of over 10%. The overall positivity rate of the country was nearly at 1.68% last week as compared to that of 5.86% earlier,” he said.
The Health Ministry said that on an average, there are 20,000 coronavirus cases being recorded in the country every day, of which 56% were from Kerala last week.
“There are 5 states – Kerala, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Mizoram and Karnataka – which have over 10,000 active Covid-19 cases,” Agarwal said.
Lakshadweep, Chandigarh, Goa, Himachal Pradesh, Andaman & Nicobar Islands, and Sikkim have vaccinated 100% of its population with the first dose of Covid-19 vaccine.
When asked about the delay in the rollout of the Zydus Cadila vaccine, a top health official said that the central government is “working on the trainers”.
“Zydus Cadila vaccine is not administered using conventional syringe or a needle but through an applicator, which will be used for the first time in our country. We are working on the trainers and its logistic issues… It is only a matter of a short period of time (before it comes out),” VK Paul, Member-Health at NITI Aayog, said.
He added that there are “no new variants of concern” in India at present.
Around 8.36 lakh hospital beds have been made available for coronavirus patients, and nearly one million additional isolation beds have been created in dedicated care centres.
