New Delhi: India’s coronavirus cases continued to rise by over 3,000 as the total cases came close to 60,000 mark on Saturday with the recovery rate improving marginally to almost 30 per cent.

With 3,320 new coronavirus cases, total count was 59,662 on Saturday. Active cases stood at 39,834 and the number of cured/discharged/migrated at 17,847. With 95 deaths reported in the last 24 hours, the total fatalities stood at 1,981.

Union Health Minister Dr Harsh Vardhan said on Saturday that there is no need to anticipate worst case situation with regard to COVID-19 pandemic in India like in some developed countries.

“Our fatality rate in the country continues to be around 3.3 per cent and the recovery rate has climbed up to 29.9 per cent, these are very good indicators. The doubling rate for the last 3 days has been about 11 days, for last 7 days it has been 9.9 days,” he said.

“We have dedicated 843 hospitals exclusively for COVID-19 patients which have about 1,65,991 beds. Across the country, there are 1, 991 dedicated COVID-19 health centres which have 1, 35, 643 beds. These beds include isolation as well as ICU beds,” he added.

A total of 32.76 lakhs PPEs have been distributed to state governments by the centre, the Minister said.

Health Minister reviews situation in N-E states

The minister held a meeting with Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Tripura and Sikkim to review the status of COVID-19 in the north-eastern states along with the measures being taken for its containment and management.

He said only Assam and Tripura have active COVID-19 cases and the other states are all in the green zone.

He advised the states to ensure that the returning migrant labourers, students and those returning from abroad should be screened and quarantined as per the guidelines and laid down protocol.

The minister said that testing capacity has increased in the country and it is 95,000 tests per day. . Cumulatively, 15,25,631 tests have been done so far for COVID-19.

Over 19,000 Covid-19 cases in Maharashtra alone

Maharashtra continues to remain the worst-hit state with 19,063 cases, almost a third of that in the country. Gujarat has 7,402 cases and Delhi 6,318.

As many as 714 police officials have tested positive for COVID-19 in Maharashtra, including 648 active cases.

The Delhi government on Saturday declared three more private hospitals for admitting COVID-19 patients. Fortis Hospital, Shalimar Bagh, Saroj Medical Institute, Rohini Sector-19, and Khushi Hospital, Dwarka, with 50 isolation beds each, have been declared as COVID hospitals by the Delhi government for “admitting confirmed or suspected cases of COVID-19 on payment basis.”

New hospital discharge policy for Covid-19 patients

The Health Ministry on Saturday issued revised discharge policy for COVID-19 patients.

It said that mild/very mild/pre-symptomatic cases admitted to a COVID care facility will undergo regular temperature and pulse oximetry monitoring. The patient can be discharged after 10 days of symptom onset and no fever for 3 days in such cases. There will be no need for testing prior to discharge.

Patients on oxygenation, whose fever does not get resolved within 3 days and demand of oxygen therapy continue, will be discharged only after resolution of clinical symptoms and their ability to maintain oxygen saturation for three consecutive days. (ANI)