Covid-19 cases in less than 2% of population, says govt

New Delhi: India's Covid-19 cases account for less than 2% of the population, indicating containment measures have worked to keep the spread under control as compared to many other countries where the share of the affected population is much higher, the government said.

At the same time, the government said this meant 98% of the population was still vulnerable and susceptible to infection, emphasising on the need to continue stringent containment measures and Covid appropriate behaviour.

The health ministry's formulation at a media briefing on Tuesday raised eyebrows as the claim that 98% of the population is vulnerable seemed to assume the incidence of Covid-19 infections was strictly limited to the 2.5 crore cases reported so far.

The claim ignored the finding of the national sero-survey that one-fifth of the population was exposed to the disease.

If the intention was to show that a low percentage of the population was reported for Covid-19, the juxtaposition of the 98% population as vulnerable claim was puzzling, and flew in the face of official statistics on antibody prevalence.

While the government’s estimates are based on the number of Covid-19 positive cases reported, findings of the last serological survey conducted by ICMR showed almost one fifth or 21.4% of the country's adult population (18 years and above) had been exposed to Covid-19 by mid-December