Less than half a per cent of active Covid-19 cases are now on ventilators

Health ministry highlights India's self-sufficiency in ventilators with the share of domestic production by volume reaching 96%

Only 0.27 per cent of the total active cases in the country were on ventilators, the health ministry said on Tuesday, while highlighting how India had become self-sufficient in manufacturing ventilators with the share of domestic production in volume terms reaching 96 per cent. 

Besides, India is also ramping up its testing capacity, having conducted more than 20 million tests so far and 600,000 tests in a single day - the highest yet. 

Around 25-30 per cent of the tests being conducted are rapid antigen, while the remaining are the RT-PCR tests that are considered the gold standard in Covid diagnosis.

“We have adopted a policy of intelligent and calibrated testing depending on which area needs more testing...We are trying to reach 10 lakh (one million) tests per day,” said Balram Bhargava, director general, Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR). 

ICMR has also asked states to analyse their data and have a ‘data driven response’ to the pandemic. “There is enough data now...States need to ‘know the epidemic’,” Bhargava said.

On the issue of vaccines, Bhargava said that while there is no drug on vaccine available yet it was not just the development but the prioritisation and distribution such as logistics, cold chain, stockpiling and training of people to administer the vaccine which is also important.

Bharat Biotech, Zydus Cadilla has finished the phase one and moved to second phase trials in 11 sites. Serum Institute will begin the second phase trials of Oxford university- Astra Zeneca vaccine within a week. 

While the fatality rate is now 2.1 per cent, the lowest since the lockdown, the health ministry rejected the allegations that certain states are under-reporting deaths. It said that the states with the most number of covid fatalities are among states with much higher level of registration and medical certification of death. 

For instance, while the national average of medically certified deaths is around 22 per cent, it is 67 per cent in Maharashtra, 69 per cent in Delhi and over 85 per cent in Tamil Nadu, according to health ministry. 

“Certain states were not reporting deaths of co-morbid patients as covid deaths...We clarified that all deaths of patients who were found positive will be classified as Covid deaths to have a standard reporting system,” Rajesh Bhushan, health secretary said.

India’s current positivity rate among total tested is over 8 per cent. “There is no need to worry if positive cases increase..It is important to find them in time, isolate and treat them,” Bhushan added.