COVID-19: Union Health Secretary talks with counterparts of 5 States, UT exhibiting high surge, caseload and fatality

New Delhi [India], September 6 (ANI): As India became the second most COVID-affected country after a record spike of 90,633 in new coronavirus cases in the country on Sunday, the Union health secretary held a review meeting through video conference (VC) with the health secretaries of five States and one Union Territory on the containment and management of COVID-19 in 35 districts under their jurisdiction.
The union health secretary engaged with counterparts of West Bengal, Maharashtra, Gujarat, Jharkhand, Delhi and Puducherry as they are exhibiting high surge, caseload and fatality.
These 35 affected districts comprise four districts of West Bengal namely Kolkata, Howrah, North 24 Parganas and 24 South Parganas. There are 17 districts of Maharashtra including Pune, Nagpur, Thane, Mumbai, Mumbai Suburban, Kolhapur, Sangli, Nashik, Ahmednagar, Raigad, Jalgaon, Solapur, Satara, Palghar, Aurangabad, Dhule and Nanded. Gujarat's Surat, Puducherry's Pondicherry, Jharkhand's East Singhbhum and all 11 districts in Delhi.
In addition to the State health secretaries, District Collectors, Municipal Commissioners and other functionaries of the affected districts also participated in the digital meeting.
"Addressing the participants, the Union Secretary underscored the need to suppress, curb and eventually break the chain of transmission of the infectious disease by strengthening the active case search focusing on the comorbid and elderly population and scaling up the testing to decrease the positivity rates below 5 per cent," said an official release.
The State Health Secretaries presented a detailed analysis on the current status of COVID-19 in these districts.
"They covered the aspects of containment measures, contact tracing, surveillance activities, facility-wise case fatality rates, trends in terms of weekly new cases and deaths. They also discussed the detailed roadmaps and action plans for the next one month. Details in terms of split of RT-PCR and Rapid Antigen tests conducted in the district, re-testing percentage of symptomatic negatives from Antigen tests, testing lab utilisation, hospitalisation status and bed occupancies of oxygen-supported beds, ICU beds and ventilator were also shared with the Centre," the release said.
As per the Union Health Ministry, there are 23,390 active COVID-19 cases in West Bengal, 2,21,012 active COVID-19 cases in Maharashtra, as many as 16,334 active COVID-19 cases in Gujarat, 5,161 active cases in Puducherry, 15,005 active COVID-19 cases in Jharkhand and 19,870 active cases in Delhi.
Meanwhile, the country registered the highest single-day spike of 90,633 new coronavirus cases on Sunday, taking the national caseload past 41-lakh mark, according to the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.
With 1,065 more deaths in the last 24 hours, the cumulative toll reached 70,626.
The total case tally stands at 41,13,812 including 8,62,320 active cases and 31,80,866 cured/ discharged/ migrated cases. (ANI)