The government on Thursday said that 19.89 per cent COVID-19 patients have recovered, the novel coronavirus spread is minimised and the doubling rate is increased, giving a major boost to the country's battle against the pandemic.
Asserting that the growth of coronavirus cases in the country has been more or less linear and not exponential, C K Mishra, the chairman of Empowered Group Two said, "This indicates that the strategies we adopted have succeeded in containing the infection to a particular level. Post imposition of lockdown, while the number of new positive cases has increased by 16 times, testing increased by 24 times."
He added that due to the lockdown, the country has been able to cut transmission, minimize spread and increase the doubling days of COVID-19. Mishra also said that the number of dedicated COVID-19 hospitals for treating patients has been increased 3.5 times and the number of isolation beds rose by 3.6 times.
Mishra also climed that India has done better than a majority of developed countries. He added that there has been a 24-fold increase in testing. However, the percentage of positive cases as a ratio of testing is more or less the same as that a month ago.
"We need to evolve our strategy based on the current position... We seem to be doing well so far with our strategy which is intensely focused on areas where we see a lot of positivity and action happening. Our testing strategy has been focused, targeted and continues to expand," he said.
Joint Secretary in the Health Ministry Lav Agarwal said no new COVID-19 cases of the pandemic has been reported from 78 districts in the last 14 days and 12 districts did not have a fresh case in the last 28 days or more.
Agarwal said that 19.89 per cent (4,257) of the infected have been cured so far, adding that the total number of positive cases is 21,393.
(With PTI inputs)
