Mumbai: Maharashtra, which tops the list of coronavirus disease (Covid-19) positive cases and fatalities in the country, crossed 400 deaths related to the pandemic on Tuesday. The last 100 Covid-19 related deaths in the state were reported over the past four days, including 31 on Tuesday alone.
Maharashtra took 33 days to report 100 deaths on April 10 after the first Covid-19 positive case was recorded in the state on March 9. On April 17, the state’s death toll breached the 200-mark, and it topped 300 on April 24.
Maharashtra is also inching towards recording 10,000 Covid-19 positive cases, as Tuesday’s tally stood at 9,318. The state health department authorities have gone on an overdrive to ensure containment and aggressive contact tracing and testing in a bid to prevent the spread of SARS-CoV-2, which causes the disease.
Though Mumbai recorded its single-day highest toll at 25 on Tuesday, the authorities maintained that this was a cumulative count over the past eight days and was not reported earlier, pending verification.
The state government is worried over the high mortality rate, which was also raised by the two inter-ministerial central teams (ICMTs) that visited Maharashtra last week. The state’s Covid-19 related mortality rate stands at 4.29, as compared to the corresponding national figure of 3.17, as on Tuesday.
Maharashtra has brought down the fatality rate from 7% in early and mid-April. The officials attributed the dip to early detection and treatment. Only 1% of the total Covid-19 active cases in Maharashtra fall in the critical category, they added.
On Tuesday, Mumbai reported 393 new Covid-19 positive cases and the city’s overall count stands at 6,169. Mumbai has reported 1,000 cases over the past three days.
Maharashtra has tested 1,29,931 samples, of which 1,20,136 proved negative, to date, the officials said.
On Monday, four housekeeping staff at Mantralaya, the state secretariat, tested Covid-19 positive. This has led the state government to disinfect Mantralaya at Nariman Point and the new administrative building, situated next to it, on Wednesday and Thursday. Both the buildings and all the government offices there will remain closed for these two days, the authorities said.
