The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) on Wednesday said that the country hasn't reached the community transmission phase of COVID-19 pandemic. However, ICMR added that the States cannot lower their guard.
"India is such a large country and prevalence is very low. India is not in community transmission," said Dr Balram Bhargava, DG, ICMR. "The States cannot lower their guard and need to keep on implementing effective surveillance and containment strategies preventing the spread of COVID19," ICMR added.
Bhargava said that in a survey of 15 districts (divided as zero cases, low incidence, medium incidence and high incidence), it was found that about 0.73 per cent of the population in these 15 districts showed a prevalence of past exposure to infection. "It means that lockdown measures were successful in keeping it low and preventing rapid spread," he added.
Balram Bhargava further said the number of COVID-19 cases per lakh population in India is among the lowest in the world and also the country's mortality per lakh population is amongst the lowest in the world.
Meanwhile, Lav Agrawal, JS, Health Ministry said that the country's recovery rate is 49.21 per cent. "Currently number of recovered cases is more than active cases; countrywise comparisons unfair unless other countries have comparable population," he added.
According to the Health Ministry, the confirmed COVID-19 cases are 286,579, active cases are 137,448, cured/discharged/migrated are 141,029 and the death toll is 8,102.
