Maharashtra Covid-19 situation stablising as R-rate falls, unlocking process continues

Maharashtra seems to be putting up a stellar fight against Covid-19 as data from Tuesday's Health Ministry briefing showed that the state has controlled the spread of the virus months after it was one of the worst-hit in the first and second wave.

While the threat has not completely subsided, Maharashtra's R-value is down to one and is showing a further decreasing trend. R-value signifies the speed at which the infection spreads. Eight states including Himachal Pradesh, Kerala, Himachal Pradesh and Tamil Nadu have an R-value higher than one, a matter of concern for the government.

No Maharashtra districts feature in the list of 44 districts of India with over 10 per cent weekly positivity rate.

The only districts in the state that have shown a rising number of Covid-19 cases are Ahmednagar, Solapur and Beed. However, districts like Mumbai, Thane, Nashik, Nagpur, Solapur, Raigad and Satara, which had an alarming number of cases at the peak of the second wave in April-May, fared much better this time around.

Read | India sees 42,625 new Covid-19 cases, 562 deaths

Joint Secretary from Health Ministry Lav Agarwal commended the seven states, including Maharashtra, for their fast vaccination campaign. "Seven states, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Gujarat, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka and West Bengal, have administered more than three crore doses. We are still in consultation with them and it takes coming together on the ground on the conditions of the contract and other issues we will visit, we have made progress, we hope to make more progress".

Elaborating on how the vaccination pace has picked up, Agarwal said India crossed the 30 crore mark in 159 days. It then took 24 days more to reach the 40 crore mark thereby giving 40 crore doses in 183 days and administering 45 crore in another 11 days.

Maharashtra on Tuesday reported 6,005 fresh coronavirus positive cases and 177 fatalities, taking the tally of infections to 63,21,068 and the toll to 1,33,215 while 6,799 patients recovered.

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