Delhi has recorded over 1,000 Covid-19 cases for three days in a row, with 1,323 fresh cases reported on Thursday. The positivity rate – proportion of samples tested that return positive – has also remained over 6% for three consecutive days. The positivity rate stood at 6.69% on Thursday with 19,776 tests having been conducted, as per the government’s health bulletin. This number, however, is unlikely to have captured the total number of cases in the Delhi as many people now test themselves using home kits. City doctors say that patients now come to them with a positive result for consultations. The good thing so far is that the number of hospital admissions and deaths have not increased proportionally. There are 165 patients hospitalised with the infection at present as per the daily bulletin. In comparison, when over 1,000 cases were recorded for three consecutive days in March last year ahead of the massive delta variant driven wave, there were 1,094 persons in the hospital. There have been 15 deaths with the infection in June and 35 deaths in May. City doctors, however, say in most cases, the deaths were in patients who were receiving treatment for other conditions and the finding of Covid-19 was incidental. “We do not see Covid-19 pneumonia any longer, I haven’t had to do a chest CT for patients for some time now. Those with Covid-19 come in mostly with fever, cough and cold, and some gastrointestinal symptoms,” said Dr Rommel Tickoo, director of internal medicine at Max hospital. The experience has been similar at government facilities as well. Dr Subhash Giri, medical director GTB hospital, said, “There has been a slight increase in the number of Covid-19 admissions – if we were seeing 3 to 4 cases a day, now we are seeing 7 to 8. But, these patients are not admitted because of Covid-19. They come in, say for a delivery or a surgery, and incidentally test positive for Covid-19.”
