Over 80,695 active Covid cases reported in May

11,843 among them need some kind of breathing assistance

Telangana stepped into the month of May with a whopping 80,695 active Covid-19 cases, indicating an increasing demand for health-care and burden on the system from patients seeking urgent attention.

While the number of ‘active cases’ alone might not mean much, the fact that a quarter of these cases, a whopping 11,843 — as at 8pm on May 2 — were receiving some kind of breathing assistance, indicating the extent of the impact of the disease on people in the state.

These patients on assisted breathing included those on the simple non-invasive supplementary oxygen supply through simple masks, or through the moreadvanced continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) and the bi-level positive airway pressure (BiPAP), and the invasive and last resort option of ventilators.

As many as 6,593 patients on assisted breathing were in the ICUs in private and government hospitals across the state. According to officials, the actual disease burden and the number of active cases is easily more than 1,00,000 in the state. But with restricted testing, the true number of people infected by the Coronavirus is not being reflected in official data released by the government. “One out of every 9 people being tested is turning up as positive. The testing is around 75,000 a day, down from a lakh. Even if the testing is ramped up a lakh a day, then that would add another 2,800 cases each day taking the daily tally back up to the 10,000 mark,” a doctor explained.

On May 1, the state reported conducting 76,330 tests with results from 4,652 still awaited. This effectively cuts the tests for which results were obtained to

71,678. Fresh cases reported for the day stood at 7,430. On April 30 the number of tests conducted was 77,930, and on April 29, it was

77,091.

Active Covid-19 cases in Telangana which were

6,159 on April 1 rose to

15,472 on April 8, to 30,494 on April 15, to 52,726 on April 22, and to 77,727 on April 29.

Meanwhile, some of the biggest hospitals treating

Covid-19 patients, Gandhi, TIMS, reported full occupancy of their ICU beds —

619 and 137 — respectively, with nearly every other government and private hospital in the city too reporting a similar situation on Sunday evening.