The Navi Mumbai Municipal Corporation (NMMC) area has seen a sharp rise in positive cases in the last one month. There is a 50% rise in positive cases with 11,000 new cases of COVID 19 in the city. However, the mortality rate has come down during this period.
With around 350 to 400 positive cases reported almost every day, there is a constant rise of overall positive cases.
As per the data available with the NMMC’s Health Department, the total number of positive cases in the city was 22,275 on August 20 which reached 33,146 on September 20, with a 50% rise.
During this period, a total of 172 people died due to COVID-19 with a 1.59 percent mortality rate. However, the overall mortality has also come down during this period. On August 20, the mortality rate was 2.35 percent which came down to 2.1 percent. However, a total of 698 patients have lost their lives due to COVID 19 since the outbreak's inception.
As per the civic body, a sudden rise in positives can be attributed to the ease in the lockdown and opening of markets. The Ganpati festival was also believed to be one of the factors for the rise as people assembled at many places for the celebration without taking necessary precautions.
The rise in positive cases has also affected the availability of ICU beds and ventilators in the city.
However, gauging the situation, the civic body decided to set up 75 ICU beds at the COVID care centre at the CIDCO exhibition centre in Vashi and ESIC Hospital Vashi. As per the civic body, in a fortnight, around 175 ICU beds with 40% of them with ventilators will be available.
Meanwhile, under the My Family, My Responsibility campaign, a total of 720 teams of volunteers are reaching every family to check health status. On the first day of the campaign, the team reached 5,000 families. “We are getting good response as citizens are cooperating in the campaign. This is also one of the reasons why the number of positive cases is high for the last week,” said a senior civic official.
