Mumbai: With 2,259 new Covid-19 cases reported on Tuesday, Maharashtra crossed another grim milestone - the 90,000-mark - on Tuesday. The state toll till date is 90,787 cases, including 3,289 deaths. There were 120 fatalities in the last 24 hours, the seventh time in nine days that more than 100 corona deaths were reported.
In just four days, the number of cases went from 80,229 on June 5 to beyond 90,000. So far, 42,638 patients have recovered and been discharged, with 1,663 recoveries having taken place in the last 24 hours. “In the last nine days, Maharashtra has reported 23,135 corona cases and 985 deaths, which means, on an average, 2,570 cases and 109 deaths daily. In the last one week, the state’s mortality rate has nearly touched 4.2 per cent, from under 3.4 per cent in May,” said health officials.
State Surveillance Officer Dr Pradip Awate said, “Our recovery rate is close to 50 per cent. Although the total number of cases has crossed 90,000, our recovery rate is equally high.” Fifty-eight of the 120 deaths were reported in Mumbai, followed by 16 in Pune, 13 in Thane, 10 in Aurangabad, six in Mira-Bhayandar, three each in Panvel and Nashik, two each in Vasai-Virar, Solapur and Akola and one each in Panvel, Amravati and Ratnagiri and two in Nagpur, one of whom was a resident of Madhya Pradesh.
“Forty-nine of the 120 deaths in the state occurred in the last two days, while the remaining 71 are from May 11 to June 6, which have been added to the state’s toll now, after review. The health department said that in 75.8 per cent of the cases, the victims had co-morbidities,” said Dr Awate.
According to the public health department of the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), the city recorded 1,015 new cases, taking the total positive count to 51,100 cases, with 1,758 deaths so far. As for the 58 deaths recorded in a single day, Additional Municipal Commissioner Suresh Kakani said, they were analysing the death rate closely and strictly in accordance with the protocol suggested by the task force. “The number of cases may rise. We can say the next 10 days are crucial for us and we need to analyse the trend carefully now. But we have augmented the bed capacity to handle it,” he said.
Infectious diseases expert Dr Om Shrivastav, who is also a member of the task force appointed by the Maharashtra government in April to bring down the mortality rate, said, “We will know more in the coming days. Our health infrastructure is ready. We will have to see what the burden on the public health system will be. We are doing the best we can in these circumstances.” Of the 5,77,819 laboratory samples, 90,787 tested positive (15.71%) until Tuesday. Currently, 5,68,073 people are in home quarantine and 26,760 people are in institutional quarantine.
