With Covid cases rising by nearly 700 per cent over a three week period, the Centre has asked all state governments to remain on alert and carry out mock drills across hospitals, check-on existing supplies (including oxygen and medicine availability) and ramp up infrastructure where needed.

States were also asked to “identify” emerging hotspots (of Covid, influenza and severe acute respiratory illnesses).

A review of the health preparedness with district administration (across the country) and health officials will be carried out on April 8 and April 9, while mock drills at hospitals will happen on April 10 and April 11.

Union Health Minister, Mansukh Mandaviya, who chaired a review meeting on Friday, has urged state governments to “send sufficient samples for testing of Covid-19 and influenza” and also up the ante on “whole genome sequencing of positive samples.”

“Centre and States need to continue working in collaborative spirit as was done during the previous surges for Covid-19 prevention and management,” Mandaviya said.

Cases rise

India reported 6050 fresh infections on a 24 hour basis – a 14 per cent-odd rise day-to-day; and the highest in nearly 195 days. The daily positivity rate is up at 0.39 per cent and the weekly positivity rate has shot up to 3.02 per cent, data released by the Union Health Ministry said.

Read also: Demand for precautionary doses remains low, despite rise in Covid-19 cases

The average daily Covid cases has risen to 4,188 in the week ending April 7, from 571 in the week ending 17th March 2023. Against this, there were 88,503 daily average cases globally.

Active cases are up to 28,303, an increase on 2716. Kerala, followed by Maharashtra, Delhi, Himachal Pradesh, Tamil Nadu were amongst those that saw highest daily additions . Gujarat is the only State that saw a decline in active cases.

Ministry data shows, eight States are reporting high number of Covid cases with 10 or more districts reporting more than 10 per cent positivity rates across Kerala, Maharashtra and Delhi; and over 5 districts reporting more than 5 per cent positivity in Karnataka, Kerala, Maharashtra, Delhi, Himachal Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Haryana.

India also reported 13 deaths on a 24 hour basis — three from Maharashtra, two each from Rajasthan and Karnataka and one each in Delhi, Punjab, Haryana, Jammu & Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh and Gujarat.

Puducherry has reportedly brought back the mask mandate in public spaces.

Ministry data also shows that 23 states and UTs had average tests per million below the national average of 100 tests per million. States have also been asked to ramp up the share of RT-PCR tests in total testing.

New Variants

According to Union Health Ministry officials, WHO is closely tracking one variant of interest (VOI), XBB.1.5 and six other variants are under monitoring — BQ.1, BA.2.75, CH.1.1, XBB, XBF and XBB.1.16.

It was highlighted that while Omicron and its sub-lineages continue to be the predominant variant, most of the assigned variants have little or no significant transmissibility, disease severity or immune escape.

“The prevalence of XBB.1.16 increased from 21.6 per cent in February to 35.8 per cent in March, 2023. However, no evidence of an increase in hospitalisation or mortality has been reported,” officials said.

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