Young people in Delhi most affected by current Covid spike: AIIMS' Guleria

Doctor says people should remain vigilant, as the infection can "spread to the elderly" and trigger "serious symptoms"

A fresh wave of coronavirus cases in Delhi has "mainly affected" the young with most of the patients reporting “relatively milder symptoms”, AIIMS director Dr Randeep Guleria told Indian Express.

People should remain vigilant, as the infection can “spread to the elderly” and trigger “serious symptoms”. If so happens then the healthcare resources would come under strain yet again, he said..

Guleria told Indian Express that having more containment zones within a city would be a better strategy in containing the spread as some states mulled over imposing another lockdown. 

Delhi has been witnessing over 1,500 daily cases over the past five days, with 995 cases reported on Wednesday. This has resulted in Delhi getting back in the top 10 of most cases.

“As of now, most of the patients who are coming in are those with relatively milder symptoms but that is related to the fact that currently we are witnessing a surge in cases in the younger age group. But this will spread to the elderly, as has been seen in Maharashtra, where it started with milder cases and then we found an increasing number of cases, and more serious symptoms, with hospital resources getting strained. We need to be vigilant about this,” he said.

“There is an increase in the number of patients getting admitted but it’s not that we are running out of beds yet. As the cases go up, we will reach a situation where more and more patients will get admitted and that is the cause of concern,” he added.

“This is another wave and it’s in our hands how big or small we want it to be, and how quickly we want it to end. In many ways, this is a situation we have got ourselves into. For some time now, the cases will increase because of the surge in the neighbouring states as well,” Guleria said.