NEW DELHI: The national capital has witnessed a spike in Covid-19 cases over the past few weeks, putting three districts on high alert. The three districts East, South and Central have been put on ‘Orange’ alert as the weekly positivity rate has increased considerably.
On Thursday, the city logged 649 fresh Covid-19 cases with a positivity rate of 4.06 per cent, according to data shared by the health department. With this, the national capital’s Covid-19 caseload climbed to 19,46,313. With one more fatality being recorded, the death toll on Thursday reached a total of 26,297, said the bulletin.
The fresh cases came out of 15,974 Covid-19 tests conducted the previous day, it said. On Wednesday, the city logged 686 fresh Coviid-19 cases with a positivity rate of 4.74 per cent. The national capital on Tuesday recorded 585 cases with a positivity rate of 4.35 per cent and two deaths. The city saw 498 cases with a positivity rate of 3.57 per cent and one fatality on Sunday.
Of the 9,488 beds reserved for Covid-19 patients in Delhi hospitals, only 131 were occupied on Wednesday. Beds at Covid care centres and Covid health centres were lying vacant, the bulletin said. The number of active cases in Delhi stands at 2,209, up from 2,153 the previous day. As many as 1,454 patients are under home isolation and there are 186 containment zones, it said.
The national capital has reported a few cases of the BA.4 and BA.5 sub-variants of Omicron, which are highly transmissible, but experts have asked people not to panic as these sub-variants do not cause severe infection. The number of daily Covid-19 cases in Delhi had touched the record high of 28,867 on January 13 during the third wave of the pandemic.