Over 3,607 fresh coronavirus patients identified in Maharashtra on Thursday, spike the tally of cases to 97,648, reportedly reveals a State health official.
The number of deaths rose to 3,590 with 152 fatalities recorded owing to the pandemic.
Hospitals within the state also discharged 1,561 patients, taking the count of recovered Coronavirus patients to 46,078, the official said.
Maharashtra COVID-19 figures are as follows: Positive cases 97,648, new cases 3,607, deaths 3,590, discharged 46,078, active cases 47,968, people tested thus far 6,09,317.
Dr. Harsh Vardhan, Union Minister of Health and Family Welfare held a high-level meeting today (via Video Conferencing) with Shri Rajesh Tope, Health Minister of Maharashtra, Shri Amit Deshmukh, Medical Education Minister of Maharashtra and DMs of COVID-19 affected districts of Maharashtra in presence of Shri Ashwini Kumar Choubey, MoS (HFW). Ms Preeti Sudan, Secretary (HFW), Shri Rajesh Bhushan, OSD (HFW) alongside the senior officials from both Centre and therefore the States were present within the meeting.
All 36 Districts are affected within the State. Dr. Harsh Vardhan personally interacted and reviewed the status of COVID-19 and its management with districts of Mumbai, Thane, Pune, Nashik, Palghar, Nagpur and Aurangabad, while all the districts were connected during the VC.
At the outset, Director of NCDC, Dr. S. K. Singh, highlights the districts that were showing a higher number of active cases, case death rate, confirmation rate, doubling time, and low testing rate. He also presented the provision of the health infrastructure and districts that require attention against the backdrop of high confirmation rates and case-fatality rates.

While speaking on the present scenario of COVID-19 in Maharashtra, Dr Harsh Vardhan was quoted as saying, “Increase in number of Containment Zones needs immediate attention. Vulnerability mapping of densely populated areas should be finished effective containment strategy to be put in order. Also, rise just in case death rate should be looked into alongside tests done per million population.”

Regarding the health infrastructure, Dr. Harsh Vardhan advised strengthening the system of ICU, ventilators, and testing labs in Maharashtra and ensuring the supply of ICU and ventilators to all or any forthcoming patients. With reference to human resource management, he said the quality of health care should be improved with quality training to Healthcare Workers through online training modules.
He asked State officials to ensure prompt delivery of reports of COVID-19 tests to help timely detection and management of COVID-19 patients. He was further quoted, “We have ramped up our testing capacity through a network of 602 government labs and 235 private labs (total 837 labs). we've cumulatively tested 52,13,140 samples till date and 1,51,808 samples were tested within the last 24 hours.” He also stated that as on date, over136 lakh N95 masks and over106 lakh PPEs are distributed to States/UTs and central institutions. In non-COVID hospitals, rational use of PPEs was to be ensured as per guidelines issued by the Ministry, the Union Health Minister acknowledged.
Dr. Harsh Vardhan highlighted the necessity for strengthening human resource for contact tracing; logistics enhancement like including ICU beds with ventilators, beds with facility available for oxygen supplementation, etc; ensuring transport for healthcare workers; and strengthening Behaviour Change Communication (BCC) activities to scale back community resistance and counseling of high-risk contacts. additionally, it had been important for districts to make sure strict implementation of containment plan alongside the epidemiological investigation of cases for complete contact tracing and strict quarantine for the inflowing persons from the main affected areas.
The State was also advised to make sure it concentrate in essential RMNCHA+N services with special look after pregnant women alongside services like blood collection/transfusion, chemotherapy, dialysis. Dr. Harsh Vardhan said, “The State must make sure that essential services for TB diagnosis and management don't suffer as these patients are considerably susceptible to the COVID-19 infection. Active survey for TB cases should be done alongside the house to deal with surveys being conducted for COVID-19.” Strict action was to be taken to make sure the prohibition of spitting publicly places to regulate the spread. Adequate measures for the prevention of vector-borne diseases also ought to be taken, they were advised.
In delivering these services, the State officials were asked to utilize the network of over 3,775 centers Ayushman Bharat- Health and Wellness Centres (AB-HWCs) which are functional across the State. They were advised to interact with volunteers for doorstep delivery and Telemedicine/Teleconsultation for OPD Services. They were asked to make sure timely payment of salary /incentives for the doctors or employing temporary human resources alongside adequate stocks of essential medicines. He also said, “Many trials have started for medicine and vaccine for Covid-19. we'll need to be vigilant till we've finally defeated Covid-19. We must adopt good practices of every other mutually for the eradication of COVID-19. All-District and local government officials must work in cooperation with the State and therefore the Centre.”
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