Covid-19 Wrap-up: Backlog of deaths puts BBMP in tight spot

Bengaluru is witnessing a backlog of Covid-19 deaths which were not made public earlier by the BBMP. As per the official Covid-19 bulletin for September 24, Bengaluru Urban’s active caseload was 7,440. However, data released by the BBMP on the same day put the active caseload number at only 4,223. This has now created difficulties for the BBMP, which not only faces the task of making public scores of old deaths, but also because the backlog has pushed the city’s Case Fatality Rate (CFR) to 1.81 per cent.

India recorded 26,041 new coronavirus infections taking the total tally of Covid-19 cases to 3,36,78,786, while the active cases declined to 2,99,620. This is the lowest number of active cases in 191 days.

While the Karnataka government decided to allow schools to function in full capacity from class 6 to 12, five days a week, state health commissioner Dr K V Trilok Chandra said the paediatric Covid testing levels remained low at 3 per cent, which shows no improvement from when the data was last reviewed on September 15.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his US visit subtly criticised the World Health Organization and the World Bank for hurting their credibility over tracing the origin of the SARS-CoV-2 virus and the Ease-of-Doing-Business rankings. He urged the vaccine producers around the world to make the Covid-19 jabs in India.

“With regard to the origin of Covid-19 and the ease of doing business rankings, institutions of global governance have damaged the credibility they had built after decades of hard work,” the Prime Minister said, while addressing the United Nations General Assembly at the headquarters of the international organization in New York.

Canada on Sunday announced that it will allow direct and indirect flights from India, after a month-long ban on travel from the country due to the Covid-19 situation.

In slightly disturbing news, a study showed that the pandemic reduced life expectancy in 2020 to the highest extent since World War II. There have been nearly 5 million reported deaths caused by the new coronavirus so far, a Reuters tally showed.

On the vaccine front, India may soon get its first intranasal Covid vaccine as Bharat Biotech is working on a new vaccine which is in phase 2 of the clinical trial.

While the debate on whether boosters are needed or not still goes on, 99 per cent of 250 health workers jabbed with the Covishield vaccine in February at the Sri Jayadeva Institute of Cardiovascular Sciences and Research (SJICR) showed adequate immune response in September. The good immune response six months after the jab means the booster is not needed as of now. This development may also encourage more people to get vaccinated.