Mumbai once again sees spike in daily COVID-19 count with 16,420 new cases; seven more die

Mumbai reported 16,420 new coronavirus positive cases on Wednesday, around 41 per cent more than the previous day, while seven patients succumbed to the infection, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation BMC said.As compared to Tuesday, the city witnessed 4,773 more cases.With this, the overall infection tally of the city rose to 9,56,287 and death toll to 16,420, it said.For the last four days, the city had been witnessing a drop in daily cases after reporting the highest ever 20,971 cases on January 7.

Mumbai reported 16,420 new coronavirus positive cases on Wednesday, around 41 per cent more than the previous day, while seven patients succumbed to the infection, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) said.

As compared to Tuesday, the city witnessed 4,773 more cases.

With this, the overall infection tally of the city rose to 9,56,287 and death toll to 16,420, it said.

For the last four days, the city had been witnessing a drop in daily cases after reporting the highest ever 20,971 cases on January 7. On Tuesday, it had reported 11,647 cases, while two patients had succumbed to the infection that day.

The rise in the number of cases reported on Wednesday as compared to the previous day is 40.98 per cent, the BMC said in its bulletin.

Of the total number of new patients, 13,793 are asymptomatic and only 916 patients have been hospitalised with 98 of them being on oxygen support, it added. Along with the increase in daily cases, Mumbai's COVID-19 positivity rate also surged to 24.38 per cent from 18.75 per cent on Tuesday.

Municipal Commissioner Iqbal Singh Chahal said the rise in daily positive cases is due to the revised national testing guidelines.

''Due to the recent change in the national COVID testing guidelines two days ago, wherein it has been directed that only symptomatic cases will be tested, it is likely to create a spike in positivity,'' he said. According to the BMC bulletin, 67,339 tests were carried out in the city in the last 24 hours, while 62,097 tests had been conducted on Tuesday. With this, the overall test count jumped to 1,43,92,483.

Of the 36,811 hospital beds, a total of 6,946 beds, which is around 18.8 per cent, are occupied in the city, it said.

The overall growth rate of COVID-19 cases in Mumbai is 1.85 per cent for the period between January 5 and 11, while the case doubling rate is 36 days, the civic body said. Presently, Mumbai has 1,02,282 active cases and with 14,649 patients being discharged, the recovery count climbed to 8,34,962. The city's recovery rate is 87 per cent, the bulletin said.

Mumbai currently has 56 sealed buildings, but no containment zone in slums and chawls. The civic body seals buildings if the occupants of 20 per cent of the total number of flats or at least 10 residents are found infected. Last year, Mumbai had reported the highest number of 11,163 daily cases on April 4, while the highest fatality count of 90 was recorded on May 1. The pandemic had broken out in Mumbai on March 11, 2020.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)