New Delhi: The country recorded 6,155 fresh COVID-19 infections in the last 24 hours, marking a marginal increase from Friday’s tally of 6,050 cases, the Union health ministry stated in a bulletin on Saturday.
Covid infections in the country have seen an upward trend in the past few days, with the daily fresh infections at 2994 on April 1, 3824 on April 2, 3641 on April 3, 3038 on April 4, 4435 on April 5, 5335 on April 6, and 6,050 on April 7.
The overall active cases stands at 31,194, as of Saturday, with the daily positivity rate at 5.63 percent, the Health Ministry said in a statement.
With 3253 recoveries in the last 24 hours, the overall count stood at 4,41,89,111 and that the overall recovery rate was currently at 98.74 percent.
Under the nationwide vaccination drive, a total of 220.66 crore vaccine doses (95.21 crore second doses and 22.87 crore precautionary doses) have been administered, as of Saturday, of which 1963 doses were administered in the last 24 hours.
The ministry said that the weekly positivity rate currently stands at 3.47 percent.
On Friday, Delhi reported 755 fresh COVID-19 cases, in a continuing upward spiral in infections.
Neighbouring Bihar reported 17 new cases.
The Superintendent of Patna’s Indira Gandhi Institute of Medical Sciences (IGIMS) said, “Cases have increased due to recklessness and lax observance of COVID protocols. It could also be attributed to the changing weather pattern. But hospitals and the Bihar government are on alert.”
He said that compared to other states, the situation in Bihar was still normal.
“Two patients were detected with COVID-19 on Friday. They are receiving treatment and there is no need to panic,” he said.
Amid a nationwide upward trend in the COVID-19 cases, Union Health Minister Dr Mansukh Mandaviya on Friday chaired a review meeting with health ministers of all states and Union Territories through video conferencing.
Mandaviya urged the state health ministers to conduct mock drills at hospitals on on April 10 and 11 to assess their preparedness in handling a surge in cases.
He also urged states to identify emerging hotspots by monitoring trends of influenza-like illness (ILI) and severe acute respiratory infections (SARI) cases and sending sufficient samples for testing of COVID-19 and influenza, and ramping up whole genome sequencing of positive samples.
It was observed that 23 states and UTs had average tests per million below the national average.
“Irrespective of the new COVID variants, the five-fold strategy of ‘Test-Track-Treat-Vaccinate and Adherence to COVID Appropriate Behaviour’ continue to remain the tested strategy for COVID management. This would facilitate the undertaking of appropriate public health measures, he said,” Mandaviya said.
According to the Union health ministry, states and UTs were also requested to expeditiously increase the rate of testing from the current rate of 100 tests per million, as of the week ending April 7 and further advised to increase the share of RT-PCR in tests.