New Delhi:
Delhi is expected to report around 20,000 fresh cases today, state health minister Satyendar Jain said, a day after fresh Covid cases in the national capital reached its highest level in eight months. Delhi has been witnessing a huge spike in fresh cases over the past several days, with the positivity rate exceeding 17 per cent.
Delhi Health Minister Satyendar Jain was quoted by news agency ANI as saying, “Delhi will report around 20,000 new cases today, with the positivity rate increasing by 1-2%. At present, only 10% of hospital beds are occupied in the city.”
On Friday, Delhi reported 17,335 fresh Covid cases, the highest single-day increase since May 8. Delhi’s positivity rate rose to 17.73 per cent from 15.34 per cent on Thursday, when 15,097 new infections were reported in the city.
The increase is the highest since May 8 when Delhi recorded 17,364 cases with a positivity rate of 23.34 per cent, while 332 deaths were also recorded that day.
Delhi is reporting a sudden spike in new infections over the past several days amid a significant jump in the cases of the new Omicron version of Kovid. Today, the city reported 48 new cases of Omicron to take the total number of new cases to 513. Only Maharashtra is ahead of Delhi in terms of the total number of omicron cases in the country with 876 cases.
However, this time around, the city has reported six times fewer hospitalizations than in the first wave of infections.
Delhi recorded 28,395 cases, the highest single-day tally and 277 deaths, during the second wave of the pandemic on April 20 last year, according to official data.
According to official figures, nine people died here in December last year and seven in November. Delhi had recorded four deaths in October and five in September.
Health experts have cautioned that “it is wildfire right now” as far as the rise in coronavirus cases in Delhi is concerned.
“This is expected to last for at least two months, and there has been an unprecedented increase in the number of patients in our hospital in the last few days. Since there has been a huge jump in the number of cases, so are the deaths. ” Dr. Suranjit Chatterjee, Senior Consultant, Apollo Hospitals was quoted as saying by PTI.
With input from agencies
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