India’s positivity rate crossed 20 per cent, the latest government data shows, suggesting that one in five people who are getting tested are infected. This is the highest since mid-May last year when the second wave had led to a big surge in hospitalizations, putting the healthcare system in major cities under pressure.
The positivity rate, the number of cases for every 100 tests, in over 200 districts is higher than the national average with Thiruvananthapuram, Faridabad, and North Goa on top of the list (46 per cent ) – one in two people getting tested have Covid. The figure in Rohtak, Pune, and Mohali is also above 40 per cent while in South Goa, it’s 39 per cent.
This morning, India recorded 3.06 lakh cases – the daily surge has been above the 3 lakh mark since January 24.
The data, however, highlights a drop in testing. 14.8 lakh tests were carried out in the previous 24 hours while an average of 17.9 lakh tests have been conducted over the last seven days.
Karnataka registered the highest number of patients on Sunday (50,210), followed by Kerala (45,449) and Maharashtra (40,805).
Bengaluru was among the most affected cities with 26,000 cases.
On Sunday, the government said Omicron – the latest variant to have sparked global concerns – is in the community transmission stage in India and has become dominant in several metros.
“Omicron is now in community transmission in India and has become dominant in multiple metros, where new cases have been rising exponentially. BA.2 lineage is in a substantial fraction in India and S gene dropout based screening is thus likely to give high false negatives,” the Indian SARS-CoV-2 Genomics Consortium said.
