Covid-19 hospitalisations till Sept 16 at 68% of Aug total

NEW DELHI: Hospitalisation due to

Covid-19

increased significantly in September compared to the previous month but deaths in hospitals remained almost unchanged, official data showed.


During the first 16 days of September, over 12.3lakh Covid-19 patients were hospitalised — which is around 68% of 18.1 lakh cases hospitalised during August. However, 1.3% of hospitalised patients died between Sept 1-16, as against 1.5% during August 1-31, health ministry data, reviewed exclusively by TOI, showed.

However, deaths increased in terms of

absolute numbers

. More than 16,000 people died of Covid-19 in the first 16 days of September, which is almost 60% of 27,411 deaths reported in August. “It is true that infections are increasing and so are deaths but fatality has to be seen also with respect to hospitalised patients and total number of infections. We have managed to keep the death rate under control because of increased testing and timely treatment,” a senior official said. However, some experts said it may be early to assess the death numbers after the rise in cases.

“During the unlock phase, more and more younger people might be resuming work. When infected, clinical outcomes of young people will be better. The deaths may be mostly among the elderly and those with comorbidities. Also, any excess in mortality due to the ongoing surge will be reflected after a lag of 1-2 weeks,” Giridhar R Babu, an epidemiologist at the Public Health Foundation of India, said. On September 15, over 3.5% of nearly 10 lakh active cases were on oxygen support, whereas over 2.2% were in ICU and 0.3% on ventilators. India’s case fatality rate — indicating the proportion of deaths in the total number of infections — stands at 1.6%.