The health ministry Thursday said the third wave triggered by the highly-infectious Omicron variant had spread to almost all parts of the country namely 515 districts across the country reporting more than 5 % positivity rate in the last week. India’s weekly positivity rate touched the 16% mark in the last week. But, the high vaccination uptake has reduced hospitalisations and deaths.

Dr V K Paul, head of India’s Covid-19 task force, said that vaccination has acted as a shield so the mortality was significantly low, but the overall positivity of 16% was quite high. Some states like Goa reported 50% positivity and the virus was spreading rapidly in almost all parts of the country. Hence, vaccination and masking should be strictly adopted. He further added that people with comorbidities and the elderly continue to be at risk and remain vulnerable and should get vaccinated. He raised a red flag that 10% people over the age of 60 years still did not take their first dose and 25% did not get their second dose.

The ministry stated that central teams had been sent to the six states, which remain areas of concern due to an increase in the weekly positivity rate in the week ending January 20 as compared to the weekly positive rate reported in the week ending January 13: Maharashtra (20.35% vs 22.12%); Karnataka (6.78% vs 15.12%); Tamil Nadu (10.70% vs 20.50%); Kerala (12.28% vs 32.34%); Delhi (21.70% vs 30.53%) and Uttar Pradesh (3.32% vs 6.33%).

Bhushan said, on Thursday, due to vaccinations there were fewer hospitalisations and deaths despite a sharp increase in the number of cases. At present, 72% have been completely vaccinated. On January 20, there are 3.17 lakh new cases and 380 deaths. On April 30, last year there were 3.86 new cases reported every day during the second surge, there were around 3,000 deaths. From April 1 to April 30, only 2% in the country were vaccinated. Thus it was clear that as compared to the second wave there were significantly fewer deaths proportional to the active cases due to vaccination. In the fully vaccinated, the disease is mild or moderate, hence vaccination was important.

Bhushan also emphasised and said that around 99% of adults had a fever, with or without rigours (shivering), cough, and irritation in the throat. Usually, by the fifth day, the symptoms resolved but muscular weakness and tiredness were there. In paediatric patients, between the ages of 11 and 18 years, fever and upper respiratory tract infection were common, and, cases of Covid-19 pneumonia were also very few.

Providing data from 2020 and 2021, Bhushan also said that if we see at the 0 to 19 age group, in 2020, they contributed to 10% of the total cases and 0.96% of total deaths. In 2021, 0 to 19 years contributed to 11% of the total cases and 0.70% of the total deaths happening because of Covid-19. So, it was evident that between 2020 and 2021 there is not much of a difference in terms of contribution of total cases or deaths. Bhushan referred that in Delhi: hospitalisation have remained between 1,600 and 2,600 between January 9 and January 19 even when over 75 thousand active cases were seen.

Dr Balaram Bhargava, director-general of the Indian Council of Medical Research, said that the overall test performance in the country was being maintained at a level comparable with the second wave. Home tests had increased… in the whole of 2021, only 3,000 home tests were done, while in these 20 days, 2 lakh home tests have been used. Few districts were witnessing a dip in test numbers and have been encouraged to ramp it up.

Source: The Indian Express