Union Health Minister Says India Is Saved From Entering Stage 3

Dr. Harsh Vardhan, the Health Minister of India, on the 24th of April, addressed the media and briefed about the pandemic situation in India.

Mr. Vardhan said, “Testing has been made strong in the Country. Today we have already completed 5.5 lakh tests and after increasing our test frequency our positive cases are not rising.”

According to Mr. Vardhan, the COVID-19 infection cases are not rising more than 4% and saved India from going into the stage 3 of the spread of the Novel Coronavirus infection.

There are four stages of the Novel CoronavirusStage 1 – In this stage, positive cases from affected countries would infect people with a travel history of abroad. At this stage there would be no spread of the virus locally.

Stage 2- During this stage, the virus transmission takes place from an infected person to locals, like relatives or acquaintances of the ones who have a travel history from abroad.

This stage could be prevented through self quarantine and isolation. India is currently in Stage 2.

Stage 3: This is a little worse situation as this can lead to community transmission of the Novel Coronavirus. During this stage those who have not been exposed to an infected person or anyone who has a travel history to affected countries, still test positive. During this stage it is hard to trace from where a local person has been infected with the virus.

However, the Union Health Ministry confirmed India is still in Stage 2 of the spread of COVID-19 infection.

When asked about the faulty test kits imported from China, Mr. Vardhan assured return of the faulty kits and said, “Faulty antibody testing kits will be returned irrespective of Country they were procured from, including China.” Recently, on the 16th of April, India imported medical kits from China.

Mr. Vardhan updated about the growth of India in terms of COVID-19 pandemic situation and said, India is performing better than other countries, doubling of the cases is close to 9 days, which was 3 days in March. In addition, the recovery rate is also higher than the March month.

With all these updates, India is all prepared to tackle the pandemic situation and control the spread of the virus in the coming days.

Till the 24th of April, India reported a total of 17,915 active cases, 4,813 discharged/ cured and 723 deaths.

Stay tuned for further updates.