State 8,000 cases short of 8L mark

After witnessing more than 16,000 cases for two consecutive days, Maharashtra has witnessed 28 per cent decrease in the number of cases on Monday. The state recorded 11,852 new cases and 184 covid-19 deaths in the last 24 hours, taking the total count to 7,92,541 cases and 24,583 deaths so far.

Meanwhile, Mumbai continues to witness more than 1,000 cases, with 1,179 new cases and 32 covid-19 deaths, increasing the total count to 1,45,805 with 7,655 deaths so far. The recovery rate has now increased to 80.42 per cent, while mortality rate is still highest with 5.25 percent.

In August, Maharashtra reported 3,70,323 Covid-19 cases, and 9,405, fatalities related to the since the state reported its first Covid-19 case on March 9. “The highest number of Covid-19 cases in the state was reported over the past four weeks. Newer hotspots in rural and suburban areas were added to the growing list. Cities such as Pune, Solapur, Nagpur, and Malegaon have reported a spike in viral outbreak cases,” said health officials.

The steady rise in Covid19 cases in August has pushed the state’s projection of the flattening of the viral curve by a few more weeks. “We didn’t experience the plateauing of the infection curve in August because of a spike in Covid19 cases. It’s difficult to give a realistic timeline. The state is likely to achieve a peak by mid-September and by Diwali, which is to be observed in the second week of November, the curve is likely to move faster towards the baseline,” said Dr Pradeep Awate, surveillance officer, Maharashtra.

The spread of the contagion in the rural areas has penetrated faster over the last few weeks. The percentage of Covid-19 cases in rural areas has increased by 34% -- 7,175 out of 16, 408 --- until Sunday from 21% --1,024 out of 4,878 --- on June 30.

“The penetration in the rural areas, where the health infrastructure is comparatively weaker, is a cause for concer n, as the containment of its spread is a challenging task,” said an official. Meanwhile, the state authorities are planning to tackle the spread by launching Chase the Virus initiative in rural areas from the second week of September.

So far, a total of 41.38 lakh tests have been conducted in the state, of which nearly 19 per cent were positive. There are 13.55 lakh people in home quarantine and over 35,722 in institutional quarantine.