Health experts pointed out that the number of fresh cases in Kolkata and overall Bengal was bound to rise, given the surge in crowd that took place during the Durga Puja . Hospitals are already seeing a slight rise in the number of patients being admitted to their Covid wards.
“Cases are bound to go up after the festival. Hopefully, it would not be as ferocious as what we witnessed during the second wave. But to gauge the real trend, we need to step up testing. The number of cases will rise if more people go for tests but that should be no deterrent in hiking up test numbers,” said senior physician Sukumar Mukherjee, member at Bengal’s Global advisory board on Covid management.
Bengal on Wednesday reported 867 Covid cases and nine deaths. At 129, North 24-Parganas, apart from Kolkata, reported three-digit cases. N 24-Parganas and Kolkata together contributed to over 43% Covid cases of Bengal on Wednesday. Bengal’s positivity rate was 2.4%, with 35,673 samples being tested.
IPGMER sugery professor Diptendra Sarkar said how the festival would impact the Covid situation was still uncertain but if people continued to be careless till Diwali, there could be serious consequences. “On one hand, we could be entering the third wave, which would not be as bad as the second wave.
On the other, we could be seeing less hospital admission and lesser mortality due to vaccination. The disease may come and go as mild cases,” said Sarkar.
Testing had taken a drastic drop during the Puja, when daily cases went down to as low as 443 on October 16, when only 19,018 samples were tested. But three days earlier on October 13, Kolkata Covid cases crossed the 200 mark for the first time since June 19.
“Along with increased testing, we also need to accelerate our vaccination drive so that we can cover more people in a short time ahead of future festivals and celebrations,” added Mukherjee.
Source: https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/kolkata/fresh-cov-cases-rise-to-244-in-kol-docs-call-for-more-testing/articleshow/87170208.cms