In Kerala, COVID-19 pandemic curve appears to ride a long plateau

Kerala reports 8,037 new COVID cases and 102 deaths on Monday

Kerala’s COVID-19 pandemic curve in the second wave is riding a long plateau as it did in the first one, with the State consistently reporting cases between 10,000-12,000 on a daily basis since the past three weeks.

This is something all public health experts in the State had predicted, that the plateau in the second wave would be protracted and that the curve would settle at a higher plateau than it did in the first wave, post lockdown.

Even as the curve in steady, disease transmission now appears to rise in some parts of the State and if it is not contained in a timely and effective manner, the surge can sustain and result in a third wave. This is something that the State can ill afford, because a third wave close on the heels of the second can overwhelm the health system, which is still managing a substantial number of COVID-19 patients.

TPR at 10.3%

On Monday, the State reported 8,037 new cases of COVID-19 when the samples tested in the past 24 hours dropped to 80,134. This drop in testing over the weekend and the subsequent dip in cases have been a regular feature on Mondays ever since the beginning of the pandemic.

Test positivity rate (TPR) continued to remain around 10 %, registering at 10.03% on Monday, indicating sustained disease transmission in the community.

Because of the steady number of new cases daily, the State’s active case pool too refuses to go down and now has 1,00,626 patients. The number of recoveries reported on the day was 11,346 cases.

Cumulative case fatality now stands at 13,818, with the State adding 102 deaths, which occurred in the past few days, to the official list of COVID-19 deaths on Monday

The number of patients newly admitted to hospitals with the COVID-19 on Monday was 1,869, taking the total number of patients being treated for moderate or severe disease currently in hospitals to 24,572.

Total ICU admissions of critically ill patients, in both public and private hospitals, on Monday rose to 2,087, while the number of patients requiring ventilator support also went up, to 790.

Case burden

The cumulative case burden of the State ever since the pandemic began now stands at 29, 81,721 cases.

Among districts, Thrissur reported the highest number of new cases with 922, Palakkad 902, Malappuram 894, Kozhikode 758, Thiruvananthapuram 744, Kollam 741, Ernakulam 713, Kannur 560, Alappuzha 545, Kasaragod 360, Kottayam 355, Pathanamthitta 237, Idukki 168 and Wayanad 138 cases.