India Cross 1 Million COVID-19 Cases!

With the highest spike in new COVID-19 cases of nearly 35000 in the last twenty-four hours India crossed the 1 million or 10 lac mark. Although the number of deaths was also the highest at 687 in the same period the overall death rate further deceased to around 2.5% with a little more than 25000 deaths so far. The number of recovered patients is almost 6,50,000, recovery rate reaching almost 65%, which is really the silver-lining in the nation’s fight against the killer virus. This means that the number of active infections still hovers around 300000 which is not a cause of great worry for the national healthcare infrastructure as we have maintained earlier also, provided the spike does not get out of control in near future. The states, mostly contributing to the rising number of new cases, are Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Delhi, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Telengana, West Bengal, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar (showing an increasing trend in recent days), Gujarat, Odisha and Assam.

At various points of the Coronavirus invasion in India it seemed that the peak has been reached in Maharashtra, Delhi and Tamil Nadu due to declining trends shown; however, the figures proved to be fluctuating—showing decreased numbers for one or two days and then rising again, even crossing another landmark of high new cases, instead of persisting with a steady decline thus flattening the curve. This, we pointed out earlier too, is mainly because of COVID tests being ramped up all over the country which is still going on, and the phenomena of Unlock plans being implemented in almost all fields of activity in most places and the scattered lockdowns of various duration in various places/regions being imposed haphazardly, alarmed by heavy spikes. It must be said that the national lockdown was not taken seriously both by the people and the governments of several states, and now, they must understand that imposing lockdown whenever cases rise is not the solution at all. The solution that has been continuously advised by the World Health Organization amounts to enforcement of strict norms like wearing masks and social distancing at all times and everywhere once out of the homes. The strict restrictions must be followed not only India, but all over the globe till a safe and a complete vaccine is discovered and efficiently distributed.

Meanwhile, the state of Assam has taken an initiative, the first of its kind in the country, of inviting recovered COVID patients from other states to come to Guwahati as state guests and donate their blood plasma to the plasma bank set up there. The state’s Health Minister, Himanta Biswa  Sarma, disclosed this in a press conference in Guwahati yesterday. Plasma collected from one recovered COVID patients can help treating and possibly curing two serious COVID patients, the minister added. He further said that Assam is the only state in the country that offers totally free COVID tests in all labs and free stay and food at the government quarantine centers. Dr. Sarma paid rich tributes to the doctors and healthcare workers of the state who are working day and nights to save lives, getting infected with the virus in the process and not only coming back to dedicated work again after the treatment, but also donating their blood plasma to save more lives. As per the latest information Odisha has made plasma therapy treatment absolutely free in the state.