Covid-19 Factoid: Rapid rise in new cases globally, but S Korea gets a grip

Number of days taken to add 200,000 fresh cases to the global tally as well as the time taken to add 10,000 Covid-19 casualties is rapidly shortening.

The number of Covid-19 positive cases have crossed 1 million mark and the death toll rapidly has surpassed 55,000. Back home, India’s case tally currently stands at 2,500 and 62 people have lost their lives due to Covid-19. Most of the new registered cases in India have links to Tablighi Jamaat's religious gathering at Delhi's Markaz Nizamuddin.

Highlights

* The number of cases in the US is now above 250,000 while New York is fast approaching towards crossing 100,000 cases alone. 

* Germany has overtaken China to become the fourth most impacted country, only behind the US, Italy and Spain, going by number of Covid-19 positive cases.

*75 new cases were registered in Tamil Nadu in the last 24 hours, taking the total tally to over 300. The state has been witnessing a major spike in Covid-19 cases in the last few days, now has the most number of cases after Maharashtra. 74 new cases in the state have been linked to Tablighi Jamaat gathering.

The big picture

#1. It just took two days to add 200,000 Covid-19 cases across the globe.

The number of days taken to add 200,000 fresh cases to the global infected cases tally as well as the time taken to add 10,000 Covid-19 casualties is rapidly shortening. It took 122 days to reach the 200,000 mark since the first Covid-19 positive case was registered on 17th November in China and 67 days to cross 10,000 fatalities. At present, it takes just two days to attain the same number of fresh cases or deaths. 

#2. France added the most number of fatalities in a day

Just ten days ago, Italy’s share in the total death toll of Covid-19 was the highest in the world. Italy’s share then was 29% but has since shrunk to 13%. The share in the death toll of the new epicentre of the pandemic, the United States, currently stands at 16% along with Spain. On 2nd April, France alone accounted for over 20% of global fatalities. 

Major reduction in the share in the number of deaths was witnessed in Italy and Spain which were earlier accounting for almost half of the overall Covid-19 deaths between 25th-30th March. Apart from these four nations, the rest of the world has one-third share in the overall daily death due to coronavirus.

The brighter side

South Korea witnessing a sharp V-shape recovery

South Korea saw a major spike in the number of Covid-19 cases in the first week of March. At that time, the country was going through its deadliest phase – the death rate was at its peak, and the recovery rate was at its lowest and the country was adding more than 500 cases daily, on an average. 

South Korea has since made significant strides in controlling the pandemic, with both metrics improving considerably in just one month. Experts have attributed this to aggressive testing and contact tracing by the government. The number of cases being recovered daily are more than the number of new case additions. 

Among the closed Covid-19 cases in the country, the outcome ratio between recoveries and deaths was almost equal during early days in March. However, South Korea made a massive comeback with the death rate reducing to less than 3% as the recoveries have risen substantially in the country. 

(Data sourced from Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Worldmeters as on April 3, 7pm cutoff time.)