Sources of infection in half of the fresh cases reported in the capital city Delhi are termed ‘not known’ raising the debate about COVID community transmission. Adding to the situation, on Wednesday, Delhi Health Minister Satyendra Jain said there is “ community transmission” in Delhi, but only the center has the right to declare it.
However, Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia, said earlier this week, that there was no community spread of COVID-19 cases in Delhi, according to the central officials, “On COVID Community Transmission in Delhi, the central government said it has not happened yet”.
Such contradictory statements from different ministers in the same government left the city in chaos amid the growing number of new positive cases.
“There is a transmission happening in the community, but whether it is community transmission or not, only the centre can decide on it,” said Jain, Delhi Health Minister.
Delhi is one of the worst affected states in India with nearly 30,000 COVID-19 cases in Delhi to date and the death toll stands at 874.
Capital is likely to see 550,000 coronavirus cases by the end of July as per the present doubling rate. The hospital bed demand will surge up to 80,000 to handle such a crisis.
“Till June 15, the city will have 44,000 COVID-19 cases and we need more than 6,000 beds. By June 30 we will hit 1 lakh cases and we will need 15,000 beds. Till July 31, there will be around 5.5 lakh COVID cases in the city and would require 80,000 beds,” said Sisodia.
At present 9179 beds dedicated to COVID death cases in Delhi, out of which 4929 are occupied and 4250 are vacant according to the Delhi Corona App. The city has 569 ventilators dedicated to severe COVID-19 cases, out of which 314 are occupied while 255 are vacant.
According to the World Health Organization(WHO), COVID community transmission is evident when confirmed cases’ contacts become untraceable. The state of community transmission implies that the virus is spreading rapidly.
With epidemiologists suggesting that Delhi is in the third stage of transmission, we could be looking at a crisis of epic proportions in hospitals across the nation’s capital. Besides, there is a fourth stage in every pandemic where the virus becomes endemic in some countries.