Fatality in second wave of virus rising in Kerala

TRIVANDRUM: Fatality in the second wave of new coronavirus infections is rising in Kerala which reported India’s first case as early as Jan.30 last year.

Kerala currently reports the third-highest number of new cases ater the larger states of Maharashtra and Karnataka but its test-positivity rate is higher than the other two.

Though the southern state has been largely successful in keeping the fatality rate low, it has also started rising now.

Last week, the daily deaths rose consistently from 49 on Sunday to 64 on Saturday and the state is now under a grinding lockdown.

The restrictions that would continue for a week has also put people working in the nonstate and unorganised sectors under severe financial stress.

Kerala has one of the lowest case-fatality rates at 0.31 per cent while 5,814 died of infection-related complications, but experts say the numbers are much higher.

During the past 13 months, it registered 1,866,827 cases. Currently, 423,514 people are undergoing treatment, mostly at home, and more than a million are under observation.

Kerala has only 50,271 hospital beds, but almost three-fourths of them are in the private sector where charges are prohibitively high.

The government has set up a few makeshit CFLCS or COVID-19 frontline treatment centres with minimum facilities but those needing tertiary care are in dire straits.

On Sunday, it ordered the conversion of all fever clinics into treatment centres for COVID-19 patients as per the “treatment and referral protocols.”

It also stopped NON-COVID-19 emergency services at government hospitals during the surge time till May 31.

Subsequently, pioneer institutes like Regional Cancer Centre and Sree Chitra Institute of Medical Science and Technology have cancelled many scheduled procedures.

“Kerala is experiencing the worst phase of COVID-19 pandemic,” it said in an order issued with a new set of guidelines for hospitalisation.