With 769 new cases, Mumbai Covid-19 cases surge past the 10,000-mark

Mumbai surged past 10,000 Covid-19 cases on Wednesday after recording 769 new infections, the highest single-day jump in the city worst hit by the pathogen as authorities scaled up testing to contain the outbreak that is expected to peak by the end of the month.

Twenty five people died in the coastal city on Tuesday, pushing the death toll up to 412. The city has a recovery rate of around 16% with 1,686 patients overcoming the disease as of Tuesday.

Maharashtra also saw its biggest daily spike in case numbers with 1,233 persons testing positive for the virus on Wednesday, taking the tally of cases to 16,758. The state also recorded 34 deaths, which takes its total fatalities to 651.

Maharashtra’s doubling rate currently stands at 10 days, slightly lower than the corresponding figure for the country that stood at 10.7. Roughly two-thirds of the cases in the state are from Mumbai, which now has 10,714 infections.

The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation said it expects around 75,000 cases by the end of the month and plans to ramp up testing capacity to around 10,000 daily in the coming two weeks from its current capacity of 6,000 tests.

In Mumbai, nearly 100,000 tests have been conducted with a daily average of roughly 4,000. Across India, these figures stand at 1.27 million and 19,600.

The highest number of cases in the city are from Worli and Prabhadevi that fall under the G South Ward, where the tally is close to 1,000 followed by Dharavi (G North Ward) with 773 cases.

Suresh Kakani, additional municipal commissioner of the BMC, said, “The doubling rate of Mumbai (rate at which the positive cases double) is still the same at 10 days, and basis on that we have projected 75,000 cases by end of this month. This does not necessarily mean that we will have that much cases, but we have to be ready for the same. We have readied beds for around 60,000 patients, and in the coming days we should be ready with beds for all the projected cases.”

To tackle the surge in cases, the state government has asked private doctors below 55 and ones without co-morbidities to report with immediate effect to Covid-19 dedicated hospitals for treatment of patients

“The decision on private doctors was taken considering the demand in the coming day. Currently, as per the Department of Medical Education and Research (DMER), there are about 15,000 doctors in Mumbai who are at home. I appeal to private doctors that the state needs you now and they should participate in this work. The services of the doctors would primarily be for Mumbai. If needed their services can be used elsewhere as well,” health minister Rajesh Tope told reporters.

He held a meeting with Union health minister Harsh Vardhan on the preparation and planning related to the pandemic. Chief minister Uddhav Thackeray interacted with the army, navy, railways and Mumbai Port Trust officials to provide their hospitals in Mumbai, Pune and other major cities as “part of preparedness”.

Experts said increasing testing capacity must be augmented with community quarantining for potential patients. “Mere increasing of tests will not help us detecting more cases, and there are not much resources for testing asymptomatic suspects nor it is medically advisable. Hence, community quarantine is something we have to focus at and also educate the citizens of getting quarantined institutionally, in case home quarantine is not possible,” said Dr Sanjay Pattiwar, a public health consultant.