India registered its highest surge in COVID-19 cases and deaths on Tuesday with 3,875 cases and 194 deaths in the past 24 hours.
The total number of cases nationwide stands at 46,711 with 1,583 deaths. India has 31,967 active cases currently.
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“So far, a total of 13,160 people have been cured. This takes our total recovery rate to 27.41%,” the Union Health Ministry said at the daily press briefing.
Reporting backlog: Govt
Explaining the rise in cases, Joint Secretary in the Ministry Lav Agarwal said, “We persuaded certain States, which were not updating regularly to release their backlog, which has resulted in a spike in numbers.”
He added that as this is the highest spike in number of confirmed cases and deaths that has been reported so far, States/UTs are advised to effectively implement contact tracing, active case search and clinical management of cases.
Tamil Nadu, Gujarat, Maharashtra and Delhi continue to have the largest number of cases.
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According to data from the State Health Departments. the total number of cases was 49,347 of which 33,844 are active. The death toll was 1,685. Ahmedabad reported its highest single-day spurt of 349 cases and 39 fatalities, Gujarat Health officials said. Maharashtra reported 841 new cases and 34 deaths, taking the overall case count to 15,525 and fatalities to 617. Mumbai reported 26 deaths, officials said.
Earlier in the day, the COVID Group of Ministers (GoM) met to review the availability of PPEs, masks, ventilators, drugs and other essential equipment.
Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan said the Ministry has now released guidelines for rationed use of Personal Protective Equipments (PPEs) for health care workers and others in non-COVID treatment areas, in non-COVID hospitals and hospitals with COVID blocks. Different PPEs have been prescribed for different areas of the hospital like OPD, operation theatre.
He added that the use of technology is now integral for the containment strategy and is helping the States to manage the COVID-19 in a more effective manner.
“Nine crore users had downloaded the Aarogya Setu App (as on May 4) and people have informed about their health status on the application which has helped in tracing those suffering with any symptoms for COVID-19 containment. Mechanism has also been devised to reach out to the people who have landline or featured phones through Interactive Voice Response System (IVRS) in local languages for better results,” Mr. Vardhan said.
The Health Ministry has asked States/UTs to ensure that all services like immunisation, maternal-child health services, services for critically ill patients such as dialysis, cancer, diabetes, TB and blood donation services are provided in government and private non-COVID hospitals.
