Covid transferring to endemic part in Delhi, gained’t finish fully, says Satyendar Jain

Stating that the Covid-19 pandemic is nearing the “endemic phase” within the metropolis, Delhi Health Minister Satyendar Jain Sunday mentioned individuals must be taught to stay with it whereas taking precautions. Elaborating on this, he mentioned it’s going to change into a illness that can proceed to stay in the neighborhood following an outbreak, like swine flu has, even when the variety of infections shouldn’t be very excessive.
“The pandemic phase is over in Delhi and it seems we are moving towards the endemic phase… Delhi had a swine flu outbreak 10 years ago but still some cases are reported every year. Covid-19 is not going to end completely but we will have to learn to live with it. We should continue wearing masks and this has been the biggest learning over the last year,” he mentioned.
In epidemiological phrases, an an infection is claimed to be endemic in a inhabitants when it’s continuously maintained at a baseline degree in a geographic space with out exterior inputs.
Dr Jugal Kishore, director and head of group medication at Safdarjung Hospital, mentioned, “An epidemic is the occurrence of many cases of an infectious disease, more than expected, in a defined area in a particular period of time. An endemic is occurence of cases throughout the year in high proportion. An epidemic can become endemic when cases keep occurring throughout the year. TB and typhoid are endemic diseases in India.”

On Sunday, town noticed 286 new instances from a report 91,614 checks being performed in a day. The each day positivity price was recorded at 0.31%.
Observing a dip within the each day positivity price, Jain mentioned: “The numbers are not alarming. During November, the positivity rate was around 15-16%. For the last two months, it has been below 1%. In the last 24 hours, we have tested more than 90,000 people while the positivity rate is around 0.3%. As per the WHO, positivity rate should stay below 5% — in Delhi, it has been less than 1% for almost two months now.”
Bed occupancy sees slight uptick
Meanwhile, with the slight uptick in each day instances over the previous week, occupancy of beds reserved for Covid sufferers at hospitals has gone up from 8.5% to 10%. During the identical interval, the variety of individuals below house isolation has gone up by 26%. On March 1, there have been 739 individuals below house isolation. This elevated to 937 by March 7.
“Occupancy rate of beds at hospitals is less than 10% and 90% are still vacant. Tests are being conducted at all primary centres and hospitals. Delhi is conducting almost five-six times more tests than the national average and contact tracing is being done at an aggressive level. There is no need to panic at all,” mentioned the minister.
During an in depth presentation by the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare on Saturday, it was identified that 9 out of 11 districts in Delhi proceed to be of concern as these districts are seeing a lower in complete checks being performed, low share of RT-PCR checks, improve in weekly positivity charges and poor contact tracing of Covid optimistic instances.