02 May,2023 07:00 AM IST | Mumbai | Prajakta Kasale
BMC health workers test passengers at Dadar station on Feb 17, 2022. File Pic/Ashish Raje
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The number of COVID cases has dropped drastically over the past seven days with the city witnessing an almost 40 per cent decline in infections compared to the previous week. However, 18 of the 5,594 people who tested positive in the past 30 days have succumbed to the virus.
Two weeks ago, when Mumbai was recording the highest number of COVID cases in the past eight months, mid-day published a report on how the cases would eventually decline as the growth rate of increasing cases had started seeing a downward trend. Now, a marginal drop has been observed from an average of 240 cases per day to 130. In April, the city recorded 5,594 cases and 18 deaths.
Passengers are tested at Dadar station on February 14, 2022. File Pic/Ashish Raje
The last time the city witnessed a rise in COVID cases was between June and October 2022 when 173 deaths were registered. It was the highest toll after February 2022 when the third wave ended.
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Though cases were high in March and April this year, the growth rate of cases eventually saw a decline - it was 100 per cent in the last week of March but shrank to 13 per cent in the second week of April. In the earlier waves too, the peak was reached when the growth rate began to decrease, signalling that the overall number of cases would come down eventually. Similarly, this time the growth rate in the third and fourth weeks of April was negative.
A similar trend was observed in previous COVID waves and surges. The last surge was experienced in May and June 2022 when the cases rose to over 125 per cent in a week. But after this, cases began to decline. The phenomenon has also been witnessed during the third wave, which peaked in January 2022.
An official from the BMC said, "Though the cases were increasing the number of symptomatic cases was very low and the positive cases were reported in the wake of mandatory testing at hospitals or for travelling purposes. Now even those cases are on the decline."
