DELHI LOGS HIGHESTEVER SURGE IN CASES
City on Tuesday reported 3,947 cases, taking the total to 66,602
NEW DELHI: In its highest ever single-day spike of COVID-19 cases, Delhi on Tuesday reported 3,947 cases, taking the total here to 66,602. And with 2,711 patients getting cured, the total number of recoveries here reached 39,313. However, the Capital also added 68 deaths on Tuesday, taking the total number of COVID19 fatalities to 2,301. Significantly, the city also tested 16,952 samples in the last 24 hours, taking the total number of tests conducted here to over 4 lakh. Tests in the city have grown exponentially in the last one week after a highlevel review meeting between Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and Home Minister Amit Shah had yielded drastic decisions to be taken. The introduction of Rapid Antigen testing here has also ramped up testing numbers. The Delhi government also said on Tuesday that the total number of active patients in the city stood at 24,998, of which 12,963 were under home isolation. After several meetings and representations with the special committee headed by NITI Aayog Member Dr VK Paul, the guidelines on monitoring home isolation patients have been made more stringent which has caused confusion among many residents.
Since most home isolation cases are found in containment zones, a fresh SOP issued by the Delhi Directorate General of Health Services spelled out ways for stricter monitoring there. “Active case search will be done in Containment Zones. Testing of suspects will be augmented by Universal application of Rapid Antigen Test,” the order had said.
The order has also directed officials to deploy police personnel in containment zones to ensure physical distancing measures are strictly followed along with “prevention of intermixing of the population” inside the Containment Zone.
In the meantime, the Delhi government has also managed to consistently increase its bed capacity here, with Tuesday's official figures showing that the Capital now had 7,125 vacant COVID-19 beds to deal with the onslaught of cases.
However, with new orders to shift all COVID-19 patients to COVID Care Centres before allowing them to home quarantine is Delhi's next big challenge as the number of empty beds at these centres is not increasing at a similar rate. As per officials, only 137 beds are vacant at Dedicated COVID Health Centres and 4,302 are available at Dedicated COVID Care Centres.