Coronavirus outbreak: Mumbai reports 41 deaths in a single day

Mumbai Mayor Kishori Pednekar (left) visited Wankhede Stadium on Saturday to check on the possibility of setting a COVID-19 care centre in case of an emergency. Pic/Suresh Karkera

Both Maharashtra and Mumbai set records for the highest number of deaths recorded in a single day on Saturday. While the state reported 67 COVID-related deaths, 41 were from Mumbai. Meanwhile, the civic body is rushing to make arrangements for COVID care centres in anticipation of the growing number of cases expected over the next few weeks.

State health department officials said that barring the 41 deaths in Mumbai, seven cases were recorded in Pune, seven in Thane, five in Aurangabad, three in Jalgaon, two in Mira-Bhayandar and one each in Nashik and Solapur. Among the patients who died, 38 were senior citizens, while 44 were suffering from other ailments such as hypertension and diabetes. Four patients who died were less than 40 years old. State health officials clarified that among the total number of deaths, 22 had occurred over the last 24 hours, while others were confirmed on Saturday, and they had died between April 14 - May 14. Maharashtra now has 1,135 COVID-related deaths.

According to the figures released by the state government, Maharashtra had more than 1,600 new cases on Saturday and 884 of them were from Mumbai. In addition to Mumbai's count of confirmed cases, there were 236 additional patients who had tested positive but are yet to be added to the tally.

While work on COVID care centres in various large open spaces is underway, the one at MMRDA grounds in BKC is nearing completion and will be ready by the end of this week. The care centre at MMRDA grounds is the second largest isolation facility in the city and it can accommodate around 1,000 patients. "The finishing touches are being done. The beds have arrived and we will set them up on Sunday. The facility should be ready by Monday after which we will hand it over to the BMC, which will run the COVID care centre," said an official from MMRDA.

The civic body needs more staff members to run the new COVID care centre and other medical facilities for which they recently hired 100 doctors and around 650 nurses so far. "Around 50 doctors were hired to tend to patients at the Trauma Care, Seven Hills and Kasturba hospitals. We appointed 50 additional doctors and they will start their duties at the COVID care centre at MMRDA grounds from Monday onwards," said a senior civic official.

The count in Dharavi touched nearly 1,200 cases with 53 patients testing positive, which included seven cases from Matunga Labour Camp, five from Kumbharwada and four from the transit camp. There were 11 new cases in Mahim of which three patients were residents of Mori Road while four new cases were reported in Dadar, taking the total number of cases in G North ward to be 1,539 cases.

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