COVID-19 infection rate in India has slowed down to "flatten the curve": Govt

Striking a positive note on the COVID-19 situation in India, the Centre on Thursday said it has been able to slow down the infection rate to flatten the curve and minimise the spread during the period of the national lockdown which has entered the 30th day.

As the number of coronavirus cases inches towards 23,000, top officials of the union government and the Indian Council of Medical Research(ICMR) said the situation is "currently stable" and the growth of the infections has been more or less linear and not exponential, adding the testing has also been ramped up consistently though it was not enough.

The lockdown announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi is in force since March 25 in a bid to halt the spread of the pandemic. It was extended on April 15 for another 19 days till May 3.

In another positive development, the officials said that despite a 24-fold increase in testing, the percentage of positive cases is not rising. The percentage of positive cases as a ratio of testing is more or less the same as that a month ago.

Responding to a question over the prospects of India reaching the peak infection rate by May 3, ICMR Director-General Dr Balram Bhargava said," the situation is currently going stable and you can even say that we have been able to flatten the curve. However, it is difficult to say if the peak will come. In epidemiology, the idea of slowing the spread of virus so that fewer people need to seek treatment at any given time is known as flattening the curve.

"During the 30 days of lockdown, we have been able to cut transmission, minimize spread and increase the doubling days of COVID-19. We have been able to consistently ramp up our testing and utilise our time preparing for the future in case the virus spreads further," Environment Secretary C K Mishra, the chairman of Empowered Group Two, told a daily media briefing on the COVID-19 situation in the country.

The growth of COVID-19 cases has been more or less linear, not exponential; this indicates that the strategies we adopted have succeeded in containing the infection to a particular level. Post-imposition of lockdown, while the number of new positive cases has increased by 16 times, testing increased by 24 times," Mishra said in his presentation.

Mishra said one crucial weapon the government employed during the 30-day lockdown period is RT-PCR test to ascertain if one has contracted the disease or not. RT-PCR, which is a nose and throat swab test, still remains the gold standard for COVID-19 testing.

As on March 23, nearly 15,000 tests were done across the country and by April 22 more than 5 lakh tests were conducted, which is about "33 times in 30 days", he said, adding, "But we are conscious of the fact that this is not enough and we have to continuously ramp up testing in the country and we will do that."