Rise in virus cases not fourth wave: ICMR
NEW DELHI: The current spike in the number of daily COVID-19 cases in India cannot be termed as the fourth wave of the pandemic, Samiran Panda, Additional Director General of the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), said on Sunday.
Speaking exclusively to IANS, Panda said the surge has been observed at district levels, hence it cannot be said that the country is moving towards a fourth wave.
“Some surges have been observed at district levels. This is a called a blip. Blips are confined to certaingeographicalregionsofthecountry,”hesaid.
While arguing why this is not the indication of a fourth wave, Panda gave four reasons in favour of the statement.
He said that first of all, the surge has been found at some local levels which is due to the testing ratio.
“Secondly, what we see is just a blip and we cannot say that entire states are under the grip of COVID-19.” Thirdly, there is no increase in the hospital admission across the country, he noted.
And most importantly, according to Panda, no new variant has been found yet which indicates that there is no fourth wave right now.
While talking about the positivity rate, he said that sometimes the rate goes up because of low testing.
Meanwhile, India on Sunday reported 3,324 fresh COVID-19 cases, a marginal decline against the 3,688 infections registered the previous day, the Union Health Ministry said.
In the same period, the country also reported 40 COVID-19 fatalities, taking the nationwide death toll to 5,23,843.
The active caseload stood at 19,092 cases, accounting for 0.04 per cent of the country’s total positive cases.
The recovery of 2,876 patients in the last 24 hours took the cumulative tally to 4,25,36,253. Consequently, India’s recovery rate stands at 98.74 per cent.
Also in the same period, a total of 4,71,087 tests were conducted across the country, increasing the overall to 83.79 crore.
While, the weekly positivity rate stood at 0.68 per cent, the daily positivity rate reported a marginal rise of 0.71 per cent.
As of Sunday morning, India’s COVID-19 vaccination coverage exceeded 189.17 crore, achieved via 2,33,70,193 sessions.
Over 2.90 crore adolescents have been administered with a first dose of COVID-19 jab since the beginning of vaccination drive for this age bracket.