Just five districts – three of them in Maharashtra – have reported nearly 57% of all new cases in the last two days

The number of reported coronavirus cases in India rose over 10 percent over the past two days to 85,940, data from the morning update of the ministry of health and family welfare (MoHFW) showed. This is roughly in line with the rate of increase in the previous 48 hours, when the reported case count rose to 78,003 on Thursday.So far this week, the number of cases has gone up by 28 percent (between Monday morning and Saturday morning). This is a slower rate of increase compared to the previous five days, when confirmed cases had risen by 36 percent.
After tapering last month, Indias coronavirus trajectory has picked up this month, with new infections rising faster than several Asian peers and deaths rising faster than in most other badly-hit countries.
Indias case count has now roughly doubled in the last twelve days. This is a much slower rate compared to early-April, when cases were doubling every four days. Deaths have also seen a slower rise compared to the trend in early-April but have picked up pace over the past couple of weeks. Indias death toll from covid-19 as of Saturday morning was 2,752, roughly double what it was twelve days ago.
At the rate of compounded daily growth in this twelve-day period, the number of cases could cross 100,000 by next Tuesday, two days after the current phase of the lockdown ends. The continuing rise in cases poses a severe challenge for Indias strained medical capacity and overburdened health system.
At 21,468, Maharashtra leads in terms of the number of active cases, according to the health ministry update this morning. Active cases exclude deaths and recoveries from the list of confirmed cases.
Next on the list is Tamil Nadu with 7,438 active cases, followed by Gujarat, with 5,290 patients still under treatment. Delhi is fourth on the list with 5,254 active cases and Madhya Pradesh fifth with 2,073. The top five states together account for 78 percent of the active cases nationally, and the top ten states account for 93 percent of all cases. Nationally, the active case count was 53,035 as of Saturday morning.
Source: MoHFW
Over the past seven days, Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, and Delhi have seen the highest spike in cases among the top ten states with most cases. These three states account for 81 percent of all the new active cases in this period. Over the same period, fatalities have also surged the most in Delhi, Tamil Nadu, and Maharashtra, which account for 55 percent of all covid-related deaths over the past seven days. Active cases have risen much slower in Gujarat, Punjab, Uttar Pradesh and Andhra Pradesh compared to previous weeks.
Among top ten states with most active cases, the case fatality rates are the highest in West Bengal (9.1%), Gujarat (6.1%), and Madhya Pradesh (5.4%). Indias case fatality rate continues to hover around 3.2%. Among all states, the case fatality rates are the lowest in Odisha (0.4%), Bihar (0.7%), Kerala (0.7%) and Tamil Nadu (0.7%).
Over the past two days, Mumbai, Chennai, Thane, Ahmedabad, and Pune districts have seen the biggest spike in confirmed cases nationally. These five districts account for 57 percent of new cases over this period, data compiled by howindialives.com last evening shows. Other districts that have seen a sharp spike over the past two days are Indore, Aurangabad (Maharashtra) and Udaipur.
Source: MoHFW, state health ministries and national/regional publications
Source: NDMA, state health ministries and national/regional publications
So far, 553 districts have confirmed cases in the country. Mumbai (17,623 cases) has reported the most number of cases nationally among all districts, followed by Ahmedabad (7,171) in Gujarat. Chennai (5,940) in Tamil Nadu, Pune (3,621) in Maharashtra, and Thane (3,499) in Maharashtra are the other leading districts. These top five districts now account for 49 percent of confirmed cases in the country.
Indore (2,369) in Madhya Pradesh, Jaipur (1,371) in Rajasthan, Kolkata (1,227) in West Bengal, Surat (1,015) in Gujarat, and Jodhpur (1,011) in Rajasthan are the other high-burden districts which figure in the list of top ten districts. The top ten districts account for 58 percent of all the confirmed cases nationally. District-wise data for Delhi are unavailable and hence not part of this list.
Most of Indias hotspots so far have been urban affluent districts, with richer states hit harder than the rest.
Meanwhile, the global coronavirus case count has crossed 4.5 million even as some badly hit countries begin to relax lockdown measures after over a month.
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