Bengaluru hits pandemic record with 30,000 Covid cases

Bengaluru Urban breached its second wave record of highest single-day tally, with 30,540 Covid-19 cases being reported on Thursday. Karnataka also registered a steep spike of 47,754 new cases and 29 fatalities.

The state had recorded 41,457 infections on Tuesday and 40,499 on Wednesday.

Bengaluru had reported 26,756 cases on April 30, 2021, the highest during the peak of the second wave of the pandemic.

Amid the inflow of new cases, the percentage of Covid-19 hospitalisations rose from 1.55per cent six days ago to 1.82per cent on Thursday evening.

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The current data shows that the bed occupancy rate during this one week rose by 143per cent, mostly driven by people with little or no symptoms.

Out of the 5,344 hospital beds occupied in the state on Thursday, 3,897 patients were people on general beds, while only 467 patients required an ICU or ICU-ventilator bed.

Dr Thrilok Chandra, Special Commissioner (Health), Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP), said that there has been a trend of people going to hospitals even when it is not necessary.

“In the last week, in Bengaluru, there have been consistent admissions of 160 to 200 people per day in private hospitals and most of them go into general beds. This is an indication the pandemic is driving some unnecessarily to hospitals,” he said.

A notification from the Department of Health And Family Welfare earlier this week had attempted to stem such hospitalisations by noting that mildly symptomatic individuals and those not in need of emergency critical care should not visit hospitals. “The notification aims to prevent any unnecessary strain on the medical infrastructure,” Dr Chandra explained.

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However, according to the Private Hospital and Nursing Home Association (PHANA), most of the people turning up at hospitals are those with the disease and comorbidities, or with continuous 100°F fever or a deteriorating oxygen saturation. Many are also said to be people aged 60 and above.

Dr T R Hemkumar, an Internal Medicine specialist at Sakra World Hospital, corroborated this, saying that most patients who are hospitalised are people “with severe comorbidities like heart disease, kidney disease or immuno-suppressed patients".

But if the scale of Covid-related teleconsultations, which doctors say have also surged, is an indication, there are a mass of cases building up.

According to Dr H M Prasanna, president of PHANA, the actual number of positive cases may be double that of official case figures — due to the widespread prevalence of unreported home tests.

“Many of these people are educated but do not want to announce their result to the government for fear of being triaged and repeatedly contacted by the government,” he said.

The mounting caseload means that people must visit hospitals if they choose to, because in some cases, not doing so could be detrimental.

“The government cannot ask people to abstain from going to hospitals unless their symptoms are severe. This was also seen in the second wave, where people were told not to come to hospitals unless their condition was serious. When people in home isolation waited until their symptoms turned serious enough for hospitalisation, they found that there were few available beds,” he added.

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