Covid-19: Rise In Cases In Delhi A Cause For Concern, Is It Going To Be A Hotspot Again?

The national capital which was one of the early coronavirus hotspots in the country is seeing an increase in the Covid-19 cases. This is raising fears of a third wave of infection in the city.

(PTI Photo/Manvender Vashist)

New Delhi: On Wednesday, Delhi recorded over 5600 cases in a day which was the highest single-day spike. The national capital became one of the worst-hit states in the country with a single-day spike going over 5000 on Wednesday. Delhi has been seeing a spike in a case over the last seven days on Tuesday it recorded over 4500 cases. With the festive season, the country usually sees an annual spike in pollution levels as well. Delhi Health Minister Satyendra Jain told the press on Thursday that the AAP party has changed its anti-Corona strategy by conducting aggressive tracing and testing in the city. He said that this maybe a third wave but will wait another week to see the trends before declaring it the third wave. Jain told the media that the Delhi government has started conducting aggressive tracing and testing of all family members and close contacts of those found infected with the virus. According to PTI, Jain said “And, we are at times, testing them twice after a gap of 4-5 days. We don't want to leave any positive case...we have changed our strategy that's why the number of cases has gone up. I believe that this strategy would be successful.” He said that earlier the Dehli government was only testing family members if they showed Covid-like symptoms when he was asked by the media if they weren’t conducting tests of the family members. "Our main focus is that not a single (COVID-19) case should be left for testing. You can see a rise in the number of cases, but it is a good strategy and its results should be seen soon," he said according to PTI. According to the health bulletin released on Wednesday, 40 deaths were reported, while 44 deaths were recorded on Tuesday, 54 deaths on Monday, and 33 deaths on Sunday. "Day-wise fatality is one thing, but if we look at the moving average of 10 days, the death rate is 0.99 percent and the overall case fatality rate is 1.73 percent,' said Jain said. The Union Health Secretary had held a meeting with the Health Secretary of Delhi today over the spike in cases. According to an NDTV report, the Delhi government told Centre that the spike is due to social gatherings during festivities, the deteriorating air quality, increasing incidences of respiratory disorders, clusters of positive cases at workplaces and fatigue among frontline workers. The Centre asked Delhi to aggressively ramp up testing and increase RT-PCR tests, focus on contact tracing and effectively enforce isolation of the traced contacts within the first 72 hours.