India’s Covid deaths cross 5,000; fatality rate is 2.8%

NEWDELHI: The number of deaths due to the coronavirus disease (Covid-19) in India crossed the 5,000 mark on Saturday, reaching a grim milestone, but with a fatality rate, which at 2.8% is much lower than the global 6%, there is hope that the outbreak in the country may not be as deadly as it has been in many countries, perhaps highlighting some of the gains from the nationwide lockdown.

Meanwhile, the recovery rate in India improved to 47% on Saturday, up 5 percentage points from just a week ago.

The country’s top experts said keeping fatalities down by focussing on health care facilities will now be the most crucial strategy to deal with the pandemic across the country, where the outbreak has largely taken hold and a rise in the number of infections is inevitable.

According to a compilation of data reported by state governments, there have been 181,791 infections and 5,106 fatalities in the country as of Saturday.

India took 79 days to record these many deaths, while some of the major Covid-19 hotspot – such United States, United Kingdom, Spain and Italy – took less than a third of this duration to rack up similar counts.

“My concern is more about mortality than the cases. Our population is such that we will have more cases than other countries, but if our hospitals don’t get completely overrun and mortality remains low, as is happening in Tamil Nadu, then we’re in a good place,” said Dr Randeep Guleria, director, All India Institute of Medical Sciences.

The mortality ratio in Tamil Nadu is less than 1% due to what experts say is an aggressive containment strategy by the state which has always had high quality public health care.

“The number of cases will definitely increase, given our large population, and high mobility. Even if we touch a large number, if we are able to save the health system and isolate the majority of people with mild symptoms at home or in Covid Care Facilities, and the mortality is not high, we are fine,” added Dr Randeep Guleria.

According to the Union health ministry on Saturday, the doubling time of coronavirus cases in India over the last fortnight has improved to 15.4 days from 13.3 days.

“During the last 24 hours, a total of 11,264 Covid-19 patients have been cured. This is the highest number of recoveries recorded in a day,” the Union health ministry said in a statement.

THE GLOBAL DEATH RATE STANDS AT 6% ; THE RECOVERY RATE IN INDIA IS CURRENTLY 47%