The Health Ministry in a press briefing on Monday, 3 May, said that 13 states have indicated early signs of plateauing of positive daily COVID cases.
The states making progress in containing the coronavirus include Delhi, Gujarat, Chhattisgarh, Punjab and Maharashtra, among others.
The overall fatality rate of the country is around 1.1%, as per Lav Agarwal, Union Health Ministry Joint Secretary. To increase oxygen supply, in light of the pan-India dire shortage, the Centre is exploring an idea to convert nitrogen plants into oxygen plants.
“Today, it is important to analyse the cases at the micro level and continue with the efforts in the areas from where the cases are being reported,” Agarwal said.
States That Need More Precautionary Measures
The Ministry, however, highlighted that states such as Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Bihar, Chandigarh, Haryana, Karnataka Kerala, Himachal Pradesh, Manipur, Meghalaya, Jammu and Kashmir, Karnataka, Kerala, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Odisha, and Puducherry need to implement greater precautionary measures after displaying an increasing trend in COVID cases.
There are 12 states that have over one lakh active cases. Seven states have 50,000 to one lakh cases, and 17 states have less than 50,000 active COVID patients.
“We’re seeing a positive trend in recoveries as well. On 2 May, the recovery rate was at 78% and on 3 May it climbed up to almost 82%. These are early gains, on which we have to work on regularly,” said the Health Ministry.
The Health Ministry added that the challenge to curb active cases still continues, and cautioned against not following proper COVID protocol.
"However, these are very early signals and it is, too, early to analyse the situation. It is important to have continued efforts of containment at district and state levels so that we can preserve these gains and reduce cases further," said Agarwal.
Free Vaccines to States And UTs
The Centre has provided over 16.54 crore vaccines to the States and UTs free of cost, as per the health ministry statement on Monday.
It noted that states have over 78 lakh doses to be administered and within the next three days, they will receive an additional 56 lakh doses.
“Under the Liberalised Pricing & Accelerated National COVID-19 Vaccination Strategy, Govt of India would continue to procure its share of 50 percent of the monthly Central Drugs Laboratory (CDL) cleared vaccines & would continue to make it available to the state governments free of cost as was being done earlier,” said the health ministry.
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