With 19 deaths, Delhi’s tally inches closer to 150 mark

New Delhi: The capital reported 19 deaths from novel coronavirus on Sunday, taking the state’s toll to 148.

Of the total deaths, data shows that more than 80 fatalities have been recorded in the last eight days, from May 10 to May 17. This takes the total deaths from 68 as on May 9 to 148 on Sunday. Health officials say that the spike in deaths took place because many a number of old cases (which were listed under review) have been listed under Covid-19 deaths.

The state government has formed a death audit committee, which is perusing case summaries of all coronavirus fatalities to assess the actual cause of death.

Government officials said the cumulative death figures refer to fatalities where the primary cause of death was found to be Covid-19 as per the report of the committee on the basis of case sheets received from various hospitals. “We are following the guidelines by Indian Council of Medical Research to report deaths caused by novel coronavirus each day,” an official claimed.

After facing criticism for “under reporting” Covid-19 deaths, the Aam Aadmi Party government on May 10 issued a standard operating procedure for hospitals and other health facilities in the city on reporting fatalities due to the deadly virus. Since then, the number of fatalities being reported is on the rise.

Of the total coronavirus deaths, data shows that 77 were aged above 60 years and accounted for over 52% of the total fatalities. While 40 of them were aged between 50-59 years, 31 were less than 50 years, the health department said in a bulletin on Sunday,

Covid-19 cases in the capital have continued to be in excess of 400 for the past few days. On Sunday, the city reported 422 cases, taking its tally 9,755. A total of 1,35,791 Covid-19 tests have been conducted so far, officials said, adding that the total number of patients under home isolation stands at 2,142.

According to the health department bulletin, of the total 9,333 cases recorded so far, at least 1,767 are admitted at various hospitals like LNJP, Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital, Safdarjung Hospital, Rajiv Gandhi Super Specialty Hospital and AIIMS Jhajjar. Of them, 152 are in ICU while 21 are on ventilators.

The number of containment zones in the capital, meanwhile, has been reduced to 74.