India is recording a sharp rise in Covid-19 cases every day. Over the past two days, it reported over 3,000 new cases each day. Prior to that, cases rose by over 2,000 every 24 hours.

As the doubling rate of cases after the lockdown increased to 12 days, the Health Ministry said the doubling every 10 days in the past two days is of concern.

On May 8, 56,342 confirmed cases were recorded, which stood at 28,380 on April 27, according to Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW) data. There have been 16,540 recoveries 1,886 deaths.

Between May 7 and 8, 3,390 new cases and 103 deaths were reported. Between May 6 and 7, there were 3,561 new cases and 89 deaths. The trend became clear between May 4 and 5 when 3,875 new cases were reported, a jump of over 1,000 from 2,573 reported between May 3 and 4. The trend of reporting over 3,000 cases seems to have stabilised now over the past two days.

“Doubling rate is 10 days. We are identifying regions which are vulnerable and striving to increase our doubling rate. Containment efforts should be stronger. It is a day-to-day battle,” said Lav Agarwal, Joint Secretary, MoHFW.

Agarwal also said in the light of the increase in cases, a large number of facilities like hotels, service apartments and lodges remain unoccupied due to the impact of Covid-19 on travel and tourism.

“People who don't have requisite space at home may opt for such facilities,” he said. Agarwal added that the Heath Ministry has issued guidelines to such facilities, which include models in which a service provider can either choose to have a quarantine or an isolation facility. The onus of providing a trained doctor and nurse lies with the facility owner, the Ministry said. The guidelines also indicated that quarantine and isolation facilities will be available on paid basis, but whether the tariff will be borne by the the individual or the State government, is unclear.

Punya Salila Shrivastava, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Home Affairs said up to 222 special trains had been run to ferry 2.5-lakh stranded passengers to their home destinations, and since May 7, India has begun the exercise of bringing in stranded international passengers. Pregnant women, students and those whose visas have expired will be given priority, provided the evacuees pay for their tickets. Shrivastava has emphasised that those who arrive in India will have to quarantine themselves at their own cost, and the Centre will not support their payment.

Up to 250 passengers have been ferried in from Singapore to Delhi and have arrived on May 8. On May 10, a navy plane is expected ro bring close to 700 passengers from Maldives to Kochi.

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