No Covid-19-related death in 15 states, union territories in last 24 hours

No Covid-19-related death was reported in 15 states and union territories in the last 24 hours and none in seven states in the last three weeks as India continued to decline its epidemic curve, health ministry data showed. 

There has been a 55 per cent fall in the average daily deaths in the past five weeks — from over 200 in the second week of January to less than 100 in early February. 

Kerala and Maharashtra continued to account for more than 70 per cent of the total active caseload. While the number has declined in Maharashtra in the last one month, it shows no sign of abatement in Kerala. For India, the cumulative positivity rate has come down to 5.35 per cent with only 58 cases per million reported in the last week. 

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal took to Twitter to congratulate the city for reporting no deaths on Tuesday. “Corona cases have declined and vaccination is gathering speed. We still have to be cautious and take precautions.” 

India will start administering the second dose of vaccine to health workers from February 13. More than 6.3 million have received the jab.

The national committee on adverse effects following immunisation, which held its meeting on February 5, has sought the chemical analysis and histopathology or biopsy report of three deaths to conduct a casualty assessment. The committee, which discussed eight cases of adverse effects, has found no relation of hospitalisation or deaths in the other five cases with the vaccine. 

“We will proactively put this information in the public domain,” said Rajesh Bhushan, secretary, health and family welfare ministry. 

The government is also keeping an eye on the variants and the effect of vaccines on them. Regarding the South African mutation, V K Paul, member-health, Niti Aayog, said some studies show the vaccines have been found to be effective against preventing serious disease and improving mortality but not very effective in mild cases. 

“Covishield continues to be effective...We have no concern at this point. We have a system to detect the variant,” Paul said. “We are sequencing the viruses being isolated in the country. We will intensify our surveillance. This variant (South African) is not in the country,” he added.