They have so far visited Kalaburagi, Dharwad; expected to meet officials of health dept
BENGALURU, NEW DELHI: Taking note of the spiralling number of Covid-19 cases in Karnataka, the Union Health and Family Welfare Ministry has sent a team of experts to review the state government’s management of the pandemic. A team comprising a Joint Secretary, a public health expert and one clinician was rushed to Karnataka by the Centre.The team has so far visited Kalaburgi and Dharwad for field review and is expected to meet officials of the State Health Department on Saturday. In a statement released on Friday morning, the Union Health Ministry said that high-level teams have been deputed to Kerala, Karnataka, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh and West Bengal, which are reporting a surge in new Covid-19 cases of late.
“Teams will support the state efforts towards strengthening containment, surveillance, testing, infection prevention and control measures, and efficient clinical management of the positive cases. The central teams shall also guide in effectively managing the challenges related to timely diagnosis and follow-up,” the statement said.
Officials of the State Health Department said the team is expected to review Karnataka’s model of Covid-19 management and give suggestions, but there is unlikely to be any interference or supervision. Given Wednesday’s number of total cases — 7,43,848 — in Karnataka, the Union Health Ministry said the state accounted for 10.1% of the national figure. “It has 11,010 cases per million population. So far, 6,20,008 patients have recovered in the state, resulting in recovery rate of 83.35%. The active cases are 1,13,557 (14.1% of national figure). The state has reported a total of 10,283 fatalities, CFR of 1.38% and 152 deaths per million population. The TPM is 95,674 and positivity rate is at 11.5%,” the ministry said.
Incidentally, Karnataka has the highest rate of tests per million at 95,674 among the five states. It has 1,13,557 active cases, accounting for 14.1% of the national figure. The tests per million population is 53,518 in Kerala, 38,605 in Rajasthan, 37,872 in West Bengal and 50,191 in Chhattisgarh, lending credence to the State Government’s stance that a major contributor to the spike in the number of cases is extensive testing.
As of now, the total cases in Kerala are 3,17,929, which account for 4.3% of the total cases while the active cases are 94,609, comprising 11.8% of the total national figure. The state, however, has a low case fatality rate of 0.34% and deaths per million states is 31. The test positivity rate in the state is 16.6%.
In Rajasthan, there are 21, 587 active cases, which is 2.7 % of the national figure, and the test positivity rate is 5.3%. With 31,984 active cases, West Bengal accounts for 4% of the total active cases in the country, but its test positivity rate is 8.2 %. Chhattisgarh, meanwhile, has 28,187 active cases, accounting for 3.5% of the national figure.
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