COVID-19: 73 Per Cent Active Cases From Nine States in India

Maharashtra, with Mumbai, Pune and Thane being in the national list of the top 10 districts most affected by COVID-19,, continues be a matter of worry. If the list is extended to the top 30 districts nationally, nine districts of the state figure in it as do Andhra Pradesh’s 10 districts. The top 30 districts account for as many as  15,04,683 or  more than 46 per cent of the total confirmed cases in the country.

In fact, just 10 states account for about 80 per cent of the cases in India. They are:

• Maharashtra — 21.8 per cent
• Tamil Nadu  — 12.1 per cent
• Andhra Pradesh — 11.5 per cent
• Karnataka — 9 per cent
• Uttar Pradesh — 6.1 per cent  
• Delhi — 5.1 per cent
• West Bengal — 4.5 per cent
• Bihar — 3.9 per cent  
• Assam — 2.9 per cent  
• Gujarat — 2.7 per cent

Pune heads the list of districts with the most number of active cases. Bengaluru Urban district has quickly climbed up to second spot, overtaking Thane towards the end of July and has continued to climb. Thane district, although third in the list, has witnessed a significant decline in active cases over the past month. Thus Maharashtra, with more than 23 per cent of the active cases in the country, heads the list of states with active cases.

The number of tests in Pune have been increasing. With 1,55,039  confirmed cases, the district conducted 6,43,303 tests of August 25, while Delhi with  1,64,071 confirmed cases has reported 14,62,845 tests and Mumbai with 1,37,683 confirmed cases reported 7,09,583 tests on the same day.

About 73 per cent of the active cases in the country are from nine states. They are:

• Maharashtra  — 23.5 per cent
• Andhra Pradesh — 12.7 per cent
• Karnataka — 11.7 per cent
• Tamil Nadu — 7.4 per cent
• Uttar Pradesh — 7.0 per cent
• Assam — 2.8 per cent
• West Bengal — 3.9 per cent
• Kerala — 3.0 per cent
• Delhi — 1.7 per cent

One district that seems all set to be taken off these lists is Delhi. It has 1,64,071 confirmed cases of which 1,47,743 have recovered, which is about 90 per cent of the confirmed cases. The number of fatalities are 4,330 or 2.6 per cent of the confirmed cases, while 7.3 per cent of the cases are active.

The chart above, apart from showing the sharp decline in the number of cases in Delhi since July, also shows the increase in the number of cases in Pune and Bengaluru Urban.

Mumbai has reported 1,11,962 or 81.3  per cent recoveries of the total confirmed cases in the district, while Chennai with 1,11,955 or 87.5 per cent recovered cases follows Delhi in the list of districts with the best recovery rates. Pune too is not too behind and has reported 1,09,039 recovered cases till August 25, which is about 70 per cent of its total confirmed cases.

Ahmedabad is the only district that has displaced the major urban districts from the top position in the list, but only slightly, with 5.5 per cent deaths of confirmed cases, and Mumbai with 5.4 per cent deaths of the confirmed cases is a close second.  

Bengaluru Urban district with more than 35,000 active cases and witnessing a significant rise in daily new cases, is a district that would need to focus more on containment strategies, including testing. But a district like Mumbai, witnessing a sharp decline in daily new cases — only 587 yesterday — but was reporting about 1,200 cases just last week, must be looked at more closely.