Coronavirus: No community transmission in India
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New Delhi: The Union Health Ministry on Thursday said that there is no community transmission of Covid-19 in the country but a "localised outbreak" in some geographical areas.
"After the GoM meeting today (Thursday), Health Minister Harsh Vardhan said that India has not arrived at the community transmission stage. There is a localised outbreak in some geographical areas. 49 districts alone account for 80 per cent of Covid cases. In such a situation, the question of community transmission does not arise," Rajesh Bhushan, Officer on Special in the Health Ministry, said at a press conference.
The WHO has not issued any standard definition of community transmission or localised outbreak but has given the right to member states to assess the situation and report accordingly on it, he added.
The Health Ministry also painted a bright picture of its handling of the coronavirus cases, asserting that India's deaths and cases per million in the country are amongst the lowest in the world.
"Case per million population in some countries are at least 16-17 times more than what it is in India. We have 15 deaths per million population whereas there are countries where it is 40 times as much," said Bhushan.
"We are the second-most populous country of the world. Despite a population of 1.3 billion people, India has been able to manage COVID-19 relatively well. If you look at cases per million population it still remains amongst lowest in the world, " said Rajesh Bhushan, OSD, Ministry of Health.
ICMR Senior scientist Nivedita Gupta said, "The number of tests has increased, on an average, we are testing more than 2.6 lakh of samples per day. We hope to see a further rise by the use of the antigen test." Of the 487 deaths reported in the last 24 hours, 198 are from Maharashtra, 64 from Tamil Nadu, 54 from Karnataka, 48 from Delhi, 23 from West Bengal, 18 from Uttar Pradesh, 16 from Gujarat, 12 from Andhra Pradesh, 11 from Telangana, 10 from Rajasthan, seven from Madhya Pradesh,six each from Jammu and Kashmir and Odisha, three each from Bihar, Uttarakhand, Punjab and Haryana and two from Assam.