After steep rise in COVID-19 cases from mid of January, the district has been seeing a steady decline in the last one week. From a daily case load of over 2,000 it has dropped to 69 on Monday and 121 on Tuesday morning.
Experts from the medical fraternity say that the curve appears to be flattening and by month-end, the daily count might drop down to single digit.
“The third wave began around the first week of January and peaked from January 15 to about January 30. But since then we have been seeing a steady decline and this was anticipated, as per the predictions of ICMR and WHO,” said VIMS (Visakha Institute of Medical Sciences) Director K. Rambabu.
“The positivity rate that shot up to over 40% in the third week of January has dropped to about 10% on Tuesday. This is a good sign and we can say that the curve is fast tapering down. But this is the time that we have to be more careful and cannot be complacent,” said P.V. Sudhakar, former principal of Andhra Medical College.
The positivity rate is coming down not only in Visakhapatnam or in the State, but also in the national level. In the national level it has already dropped to below 10%, he said.
Though there is a significant drop, the medical fraternity is cautious in saying that the third wave is on its way out and probably the pandemic is nearing its end.
It is a bit early to say, as a lot depends on mutation of the variants, but as of now the signs are on the positive side, said a senior doctor from the COVID ward in KGH.
According to the medical experts, the length of effective time for a pandemic is around three years, during which period it causes the havoc. Going by that theory and the present trend, it can be suggested that at least the wave is on its way out. But it is too early to say the pandemic is nearing its end, as mutations do happen and its breeding period can be spanned over a year. But this period should be used to fully vaccinate the entire population and ramp up the medical facilities, so that in case of a more virulent variant, it can be transformed to a milder version, as it happened in the third wave, said Dr. Sudhakar.
121 new cases
Meanwhile, the district recorded 121 new cases in the last 24 hours as on Tuesday morning. There were no deaths during the same period and the active cases have further dropped to 1,251.
