Mumbai: Maharashtra continues to report less than 5,000 cases, with 3,018 new infections and 68 Covid-19 fatalities being reported on Tuesday, pushing its tally to 19,25,066, with 49,373 deaths so far.
Mumbai, meanwhile, recorded 537 new cases and four deaths on Tuesday, increasing the total count to 2,92,008, with 11,092 fatalities so far.
“Of the 68 deaths reported today, 42 occurred in the last 48 hours and 13 deaths are from the period before last week. Out of the 13 deaths, 6 occurred in Pune and Parbhani, 1 in Aurangabad and 1 in Ratnagiri,” said health officials.
Maharashtra has been reporting fewer than 5,000 cases for the last 24 days. A comparison with the last two months shows an improvement as the average per day cases of this month has come down to below 4,000. In the last 28 days, it has reduced to 3,950 cases from 4,781 cases in November and 9,909 cases in October in the corresponding period.
Health experts insisted upon ramping up surveillance in the wake of a mutant of Covid-19 discovered in the United Kingdom and many other countries, which is believed to be 70% more transmissible than the original strain.
Dr Subhash Salunkhe, chairman, communicable diseases prevention control and technical committee of the state, said that there is no need to panic but the surveillance needs to be ramped up as the virus is mutating but there are no major genome changes found in the state till date. He also said there is no need to change treatment protocol as of now.
“The virus is changing. It is doing this even in Maharashtra but fortunately whatever changes took place have not resulted in a major change in virulence or its transmission capacity. We have not found any major genome changes in the virus till date but no one can guarantee that it won’t happen in the coming days,” Dr Salunkhe said.
