Focus on reducing COVID-19 mortality: Health Ministry directs States, UTs

Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan gave the direction during the two high-level virtual meetings, conducted on Friday and Saturday as part of the Centre's continuous process of review and hand-holding for collaborative management of the Covid-19 pandemic which so far has claimed 42,518 lives across the country.

He especially engaged with the states reporting a high caseload and higher Case Fatality Rate (CFR) than the national average, in order to advise and support them on efforts to prevent and reduce mortality due to Covid-19.

India's current Covid-19 mortality rate stands at 2.04 percent.

On Saturday, the meeting focused on 13 districts in eight states and UTs - Kamrup Metro in Assam, Patna in Bihar, Ranchi in Jharkhand, Alappuzha and Thiruvananthapuram in Kerala, Ganjam in Odisha, Lucknow in Uttar Pradesh, 24 Parganas North, Hooghly, Howrah, Kolkata, and Malda in West Bengal, and Delhi.

These districts account for nearly nine percent of India's active cases and about 14 percent of COVID deaths. They also report low tests per million and a high confirmation percentage.

The states were advised to address the issues of low lab utilization that is less than 100 tests per day for RT-PCR and 10 for others; low tests per million population; decrease in absolute tests from last week; delay in test results; and high confirmation percentage among the health care workers.

They were asked to ensure timely referral and hospitalization in view of reports from some districts of patients dying within 48 hours of admission.

On Friday, the focus was on 16 districts in four states - Ahmedabad and Surat in Gujarat; Belagavi, Bengaluru Urban, Kalaburagi, and Udupi in Karnataka; Chennai, Kanchipuram, Ranipet, Theni, Thiruvallur, Tiruchirappalli, Tuticorin, and Virudhunagar in Tamil Nadu; and Hyderabad and Medchal Malkajgiri in Telangana.

Apart from the higher case mortality, these districts account for 17 percent of India's active cases, high daily new cases, low tests per million, and high confirmation percentage.

They were accordingly were advised to ensure that the advisories, guidelines, and clinical treatment protocols issued by the Health Ministry are adopted and effectively implemented to reduce the mortality among Covid-19 patients and other preventable deaths among all sections of the people.

With focused efforts to reduce mortalities due to Covid-19, India has registered one of the lowest deaths per million at 30 as compared to the global average of 91 deaths per million.

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Coordinated, graded, and pro-active management of Covid-19 by the Union and state or UT governments have ensured the national CFR on the slide, the Ministry said.

There has been a sharp increase in recoveries. With 48,900 patients discharged in the last 24 hours, India's total recoveries have reached 14,27,005. The recovery rate, on a steady upward rise, stands at 68.32 percent.

The active cases, which are the actual caseload for India, were at 6,19,088 on Saturday, accounting for 29.64 percent of total positive cases.

An expanded diagnostic lab network and facilitation for easy testing across the country has resulted in India testing a total of 2,33,87,171 samples for Covid-19 infection. A total of 5,98,778 tests were conducted in the last 24 hours.

The rate of tests per million has seen a sharp increase to 16,947 on Saturday, the Ministry said, adding with 936 labs in the government sector and 460 private labs, India has 1,396 labs for Covid-19 testing.

Also Read: COVID Update: India's Fatality Rate Declines To 2.49 Percent, Among Lowest In World; Says Health Ministry