NEW DELHI: Even as Delhi’s Covid test positivity rate shot beyond 1% on Wednesday, the yellow alert restrictions will continue for now and the authorities will wait and watch the situation before deciding on bringing in further restrictions.
At a review meeting, the Delhi Disaster Management Authority (DDMA) decided not to impose any fresh restrictions despite cases in the capital recording an 86 per cent jump. The national capital logged 923 cases on Wednesday with a positivity rate of 1.29 per cent while on Tuesday it had reported 496 cases with a positivity rate of 0.89 per cent.
According to the Delhi government’s Graded Response Action Plan, Level-II or amber alert will kick in if positivity rate is above 1 per cent for two consecutive days or 3,500 new cases in a week are reported or if the average oxygen bed occupancy remains over 7,00 over the course of a week.
However, at the DDMA meeting, chaired by L-G Anil Baijal and attended CM Arvind Kejriwal and senior officials, it was decided that the yellow alert would continue even if the positivity rate increased. “Considering that bed occupancy is very low in hospitals as of now, we will not go ahead with imposing amber alert even if the positivity rate goes up. We will try to maintain the norms as laid under the yellow alert till further orders,” said a senior official.
As per the government data, of 8,965 dedicated Covid-19 beds available in city hospitals currently, 8,703 are vacant. “If the cases go up in near future, the government will call an emergency meeting and will take opinions from all experts of DDMA to decide if the amber Alert is required or not. But as of now, it was decided that no fresh curbs will be imposed,” the official said. At the DDMA meeting, the health department was advised to enhance the preparedness to deal effectively with the emerging situation.