Coronavirus in Kerala ‘beyond control’; positivity rate highest in the country | India News – Times of India
The test positivity rate in Kerala is the highest in the country and the ICU beds in the state are getting full. The state is also relatively slow to rollout the Covid-19 immunisation programme which was started across the country on January 16.
The five-day average trendline indicates that the cases are once again rising in Kerala since the beginning of January. On Sunday, there were over 6,000 new cases registered. The state has been reporting over 5,000 cases since January 16.
The state alone added more than 70,000 cases in the last 14 days, more than Maharashtra’s 38,000.
On Sunday, the state reported the maximum number of single-day recoveries with 5,173, yet it has the highest number of active cases among all the states.
Kerala accounts for 39.7% (73,121) of the active cases. Maharashtra, with 25% (46,057) of the total active coronavirus cases was at the second spot.
The total number of active cases in the state is higher than the combined total of the other five worst-hit states.
In Ernakulam and Kozhikode districts over 1,000 cases are being reported each day which will lead to severe shortage of Intensive Care Unit facilities.
As many as 2,14,211 people are under observation in various districts, including 12,116 in hospitals, according to state health minister.
In the 24 hours ending 2 pm on Monday, 30,903 samples were tested and the test positivity rate was 12.5%. So far, 92,89,304 samples have been sent for testing.
Since November, Kerala’s positivity rate has been above 9%, which is a matter of concern.
There are only four states with a positivity rate above 3%. Four other states/UTs have it between 2% and 3% while 22 others have 0.2% to 1.6%, an indication that herd immunity may have set in in these areas.
If the positivity rate, number of confirmed Covid cases per 100 tests, is above 5% measured over a 14-day period, the state is considered to be in the red zone and needs to impose lockdown in its containment zones. In Kerala, the positivity rate is still rising in contrast to the nationwide trend.
The state has been comparatively slow in implementing the immunisation programme. The state is at 13th spot on the list of states with the highest number of doses administered as of January 25. As of Monday, Kerala had administered nearly 72,0000 doses.
“The vaccination was conducted in 227 centers today. On Saturday, 6236 health workers were vaccinated at 80 centers. With this, a total of 72,530 health workers were vaccinated.There are 4,97,441 registered people across the state, including health workers and Covid Front fighters,” said Kerala health minister KK Shailaja.
“In Kerala, many people are testing daily and our ICUs are a reliable indicator of how many cases are there in the community. Slowly ICUs are getting full. Ten days ago, about 70% of the ICUs in Ernakulam district were full,” said Dr Rajeev Jayadevan, scientific advisor, Indian Medical Association (IMA), Kerala.
The IMA official highlighted that social distancing guidelines have been relaxed in the last few months.
“Elections took place in December that meant there was a lot of social activity. Many gatherings are taking place. Cinema theatres have been opened. What we are saying now is only an expected outcome of what was happening in November and December,” Jayadevan said.
“When elections are held, it was impossible to control the crowd. No matter how much we tried. It is impossible to enforce social distancing in an election,” he added.
(With inputs from agencies)
