Maharashtra sees 25% drop in Covid-19 cases on fewer tests, Pune tally down too

MUMBAI/PUNE: Maharashtra registered 33,470 Covid-19 cases on Monday, a drop of almost 25% and a reflection of the 'Sunday effect' as fewer tests were done over the weekend (diagnostic results are collated a day later), report Malathy Iyer, Bhavika Jain & Sarang Dastane. The state had reported 44,388 cases the previous day.
The Pune Metropolitan Region added 5,172 cases on Monday as against over 6,000 the previous day.The number of active cases in the region, however, increased to 28,201, with a majority showing mild or no symptoms.
In Mumbai, the case tally dropped for the third day to 13,648 on Monday, down from 19,474 and 20,318 on the two previous days, again on fewer tests done. The tally was 30% lower on Monday from the previous day.
In Mumbai, while 71,619 tests were done on Friday, the number dropped to 68,249 on Saturday and 59,242 on Sunday. In Maharashtra, the daily number of tests fell from 2.02 lakh on Saturday to 1.73 lakh on Sunday. "The drop in cases is clearly due to fewer tests done," said Dr Rahul Pandit, member of the state government's task force on Covid-19.
The state's cumulative numbers inched closer to 70 lakh (69,53,514), while Mumbai's touched 9,26,170. After five days of recording more than 1,000 hospitalisations, daily admissions dropped to 798 on Monday. Civic officials said that 21% of Covid beds were occupied.
On Monday, 31 new cases of Omicron were reported from the state, taking the count of confirmed cases due to the variant to 1,247.
Union health minister Mansukh Mandviya had a review meeting with five states, including Maharashtra, that are reporting the highest cases. The state informed the Centre that despite the large number of cases, the health infrastructure is not under any stress.
"Of the total patients in the state, only 3% require an ICU bed or oxygen supply. The state has adequate infrastructure and the occupancy is low at present," said state health minister Rajesh Tope. There are nearly 38,000 ICU beds in the state, and as on Monday, only 1,711 were occupied. Similarly, of the 1.34 lakh oxygen beds, only 5,400 were occupied. Tope also said that the peak of the third wave may be recorded by the end of the month.