Delhi records further dip in positivity rate
NEW DELHI: The national capital recorded 6,430 new Covid-19 cases and 337 fatalities on Saturday as the positivity rate further dipped to 11.32%, even as chief minister Arvind Kejriwal asserted that the cases are “slowly and steadily” reducing in Delhi.
This is the second consecutive day when Delhi has recorded less than 10,000 cases in a day.
However, the lesser number of fresh cases recorded on Saturday came from a relatively smaller number of tests -- 56,811 -- conducted on Friday.
Delhi on Friday had recorded 8,506 COVID-19 cases, the lowest since April 10, with medical experts attributing the lockdown as the main factor behind the dip amid the second wave of the pandemic.
Addressing a virtual news briefing, Kejriwal said, “Today, even lesser cases of coronavirus have been recorded in Delhi. In the past 24 hours, about 6,500 cases have come up. Yesterday, we had 8,500 cases. In the last 24 hours, the infection rate has declined even further to 11 per cent, while it was 12 per cent yesterday.”
“The virus is reducing in Delhi slowly and steadily, and I hope it diminishes completely and does not rise again. However, we are not going to become negligent in anyway,” he said.
A total of 56,811 tests, including 46,774 RT-PCR tests and 10,037 rapid antigen tests, were conducted on Friday, according to the latest health bulletin.
The number of cumulative cases on Saturday stood at 1,387,411. Over 1.2 million patients have recovered from the infection.
The highest single-day spike in Delhi last year -- 8,593 cases -was reported on November 11.
Delhi has been reeling under a brutal second wave of the pandemic that is sweeping the country which has also stretched the city’s health infrastructure to its limits, with a shortage of medical oxygen and emergency medicines claiming hundreds of lives.
The Delhi government on Saturday announced the launch of an oxygen concentrator bank for patients requiring oxygen support in home isolation or those recuperating after discharge from hospital. Each district in Delhi will have a stock of 200 concentrators that will be rushed to the doorsteps of the patients requiring oxygen