New Delhi: Expressing concern over the fact that 58 percent of India's Covid cases are presently coming only from Kerala, Union Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan on Thursday cautioned that the second wave of the pandemic is still present and "we should not take the situation for granted."
"With the presence of 170,829 active cases, Kerala contributes 51.19 percent of such cases in the country followed by 16.01 percent by Maharashtra. Kerala is the only state which has more than one lakh active Covid cases," said Bhushan while addressing a press conference in New Delhi.
Karnataka and Tamil Nadu contribute more than 5 percent Covid cases of the country whereas Andhra Pradesh contributes 4.21 percent cases.
It may be mentioned here that a high-level meeting is taking place over the Covid situation of Kerala till the filling of the report.
He said that the first Covid peak in India took place in September last, the second peak took place in May.
"There are 41 districts in India at present which are reporting 100 daily cases and the number of districts drastically came down from 279 on the week ending June 1," Bhushan said.
He said that India has registered a Covid recovery rate of 97.6 percent.
Bhushan said that amid much concern, India's Covid-19 scenario is also improving with a consistent decline in weekly positivity since last 3 months.
"India has observed a declining trend in weekly positivity with less than 3 percent positivity for right consecutive weeks," he said.
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He said that 41 districts in India are reporting more than 10 percent weekly positivity.
Referring to the vaccination scenario, Bhushan said that 60.39 crore doses have been administered to date.
"In the last 24 hours, more than 80 lakh doses have been administered. As many as 46,68,80,859 first doses have been administered till date and 13,69,65,616 second doses have been administered till date," Bhushan said.
Bhushan informed that the standing committee on Covid will shortly make recommendations on the necessity of vaccinating children with comorbidities.
"The committee will make suggestions whether there is a need to vaccinate children with comorbidities on priority," he said.
Significantly, an expert committee set up by the Home Ministry has recently suggested vaccinating children with comorbidities ahead of an imminent third wave.
Referring to a question about the availability of the ZyCoV-D vaccine, Bhushan assured that the vaccines will be available by the first week of October.
Referring to the people coming from Afghanistan, Bhushan said that to date more than 400 people have landed in India and anti-polio vaccines are being administered to them.
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"All the people are also going through RT-PCR test," said Bhushan and added that many positive cases were also found amongst them.
When asked about people getting digital vaccine certificates without even being administered, Bhushan said that strong actions will be taken against people found involved in such "racket."
Meanwhile, Dr Balram Bhargava, director general of ICMR said that an upsurge in population density is mainly causing the spread of infection.
"Places with high population density are reporting maximum cases," Dr Bhargava said.
Stating that the full dose of vaccine reduced mortality up to 98-99 percent, Dr Bhargava said, "Vaccination for all gathering is pre-requisite."
