Significant rise in Covid-19 cases unlikely, no new cases in 61 districts

Citing the increased period of the case doubling rate, the Indian Council of Medical Research on Tuesday said that the current situation indicates that significant increase in the number of coronavirus cases is unlikely.

Responding to a query at the daily briefing, Dr. Raman Gangakhedkar, head of infectious disease and epidemiology at ICMR, said: "The doubling time of cases is increasing, the current situation indicates that significant increase in number of Covid-19 cases is unlikely."

The Health Ministry said that four districts- Mahe (Puducherry), Kodagu (Karnataka), Pauri Garhwal (Uttrakhand) and Pratapgarh (Rajasthan) have not reported any fresh cases during the last 28 days. "There are now 61 additional districts from 23 States/UT that have not reported any fresh cases during the last 14 Days. Four new districts have been included in the list -- Latur, Osmanabad, Hingoli & Washim from Maharashtra," it said.

Joint Secretary, Health, Lav Agarwal, responding to a media query, said there are few reports of lab-confirmed Covid-19 cases which are truly asymptomatic. "There has been no documented asymptomatic transmission. This does not exclude the possibility that it may occur. Among the total Covid-19 tests conducted so far, 69 per cent were asymptomatic cases and 31 per cent were symptomatic cases," he said.

The Health Ministry added that using community surveillance and contact tracing, it is taking pre-emptive action to test asymptomatic persons with high risk contacts. This helps to identify Covid-19 patients at an early stage to treat them and reduce mortality, it added.

It also said that Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) is launching a randomised, blinded, two arms, active comparator-controlled clinical trial to evaluate drug efficacy to reduce mortality in critically-ill Covid-19 patients. "Given the similarities between the clinical characteristics of patients suffering from Covid-19 and Gram-negative sepsis, the Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI) has approved the trial and it will soon begin in multiple hospitals," said Agarwal. IANS