Everyone is eager to know when the coronavirus pandemic will end, but it is not likely to go away anytime soon. In fact, India is yet to witness the peak of the pandemic. The lockdown along with strengthened public health measures helped delay the onset of COVID-19 peak in the country, but it will happen around mid-November, suggested a new study.
The study, conducted by researchers from an Operations Research Group constituted by ICMR, has also warned that when the peak stage of COVID-19 pandemic arrives in India, there could be a shortage of isolation and ICU beds, and ventilators. According to the researchers, the lockdown helped shift the peak of the pandemic by an estimated 34 to 76 days and reduce the number of infections by 69 to 97 per cent. The lockdown was enabled the country to shore up healthcare resources and infrastructure.
However, the researchers predicted that with the available resources, the demand for isolation and ICU beds, and ventilators can be met only until the first week of November. After that, isolation beds could be inadequate for 5.4 months, ICU beds for 4.6 and ventilators for 3.9 months, their projections showed.
Steps that can be taken to mitigate the pandemic
The researchers suggested that the impact of COVID-19 pandemic can be reduced with sustained government steps at increasing the healthcare infrastructure. They also recommended increasing the coverage of public health measures to 80 per cent to mitigate the epidemic.
According to them, the management of COVID-19 will require a dynamic review of policies and significant strengthening of the healthcare system. They also estimated that the overall economic health system cost of this pandemic will be 6.2 per cent of India’s gross domestic product (GDP).
A few days ago, the Union Health Ministry has claimed that there are currently 958 dedicated COVID-19 hospitals with 1,67,883 isolation beds, 21,614 ICU and 73,469 oxygen supported beds.
In addition, the government has operationalised 2,313 dedicated COVID Health Centres with 1,33,037 isolation beds, 10,748 ICU beds and 46,635 oxygen supported beds, the ministry said. There are also 7,525 COVID Care Centres with 7,10,642 beds to combat COVID-19 in the country. As many as 21,494 ventilators are available for COVID beds, and order of 60,848 more ventilators has been placed, it added.
Modi to hold meetings with chief ministers
India is now the fourth worst-hit nation in the world with 3,32,424 confirmed cases. As many as 9,520 people have lost their lives to this condition. The country saw a record spike of 11,929 cases and an increase of 311 fatalities on Sunday, according to the Union Health Ministry data. Globally, the number of confirmed COVID-19 cases have reached 7,690,708 including 427,630 deaths, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).
Prime Minister Narendra Modi will hold meetings with chief ministers to develop a strategy to navigate the next phase of the pandemic. The meeting will be conducted in two rounds on June 16 and June 17.