Gujarat on Friday became the sixth state to cross the 1,000 mark in coronavirus cases whose all India tally jumped by over one thousand for the fourth straight day to surpass 14,000 even as the Centre said the doubling time of the infection rate has slowed down in the last one week.
As it prepared to distribute five lakh rapid antibody testing kits, which arrived from China on Thursday, to states for districts with high case burden, the Union Health Ministry said it took 6.2 days for coronavirus cases to double in the last one week as against three days before the nationwide lockdown came into effect from March 25.
"Before lockdown, the doubling rate of coronavirus cases was 3 days. Going by the number of cases in the last seven days, the doubling rate has been 6.2 days. In 19 states and Union Territories the doubling rate is less than the national average," Lav Agarwal, joint secretary in the ministry, told reporters.
The total number of coronavirus infections in Gujarat touched 1,021 on Friday after 92 new cases were reported, while the death toll reached 38 with the addition of two fatalities, health officials said in Ahmedabad.
Principal Secretary, Health, Jayanti Ravi attributed the sudden spurt in the cases to intensive surveillance and testing in coronavirus hotspots, including those which have been placed under curfew till April 21 in the walled city of Ahmedabad.
Maharashtra(3,236), Delhi(1,640), Tamil Nadu(1,323), Rajasthan(1,193) and Madhya Pradesh(1,164) were the other states where the number of COVID-19 cases had surpassed the 1,000 mark.
More From This Section
In Mumbai alone, these cases rose to 2,120 with 77 more persons testing positive, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) said, adding the number in the Dharavi slum area reached 101.
COVID-19 cases in the country rose by 1,076 and 32 deaths were reported in 24 hours, taking the tally to 13,835 and the fatalities to 452, according to the latest Health ministry data. A total of 1,767 patients have recovered, it said.
According to a PTI tally in the night based on reports from states, the total number of cases was 14,173 and 1,896 had recovered while the death toll stood at 479.
The COVID-19 cases had jumped by 1,463; 1,118, and 1,043 on the three days respectively from Tuesday this week, according to official data from the Health ministry and the states.
Agarwal maintained there had been a 40 per cent decline in the growth of new cases.
The average growth factor of cases from April 1 stood at 1.2, whereas between March 15 and 31 it was 2.1. This decline of 40 per cent was due to increase in testing, including that of cases with severe acute respiratory infections (SARI) and influenza-like illness (ILI). he said.
The official also said that India has been doing better than many other countries on the outcome ratio, which is the number of recoveries from coronavirus infection versus the number of deaths.
"If 80 per cent of the patients in India are recovering and in 20 per cent cases deaths are being reported, then by that standard India has been doing a little better than many other nations on the outcome ratio."