The Union Health Ministry said on Friday the rate at which the number of coronavirus cases in the country was doubling in the last one week was 6.2 days, as against three days before the nationwide lockdown was imposed.
At a daily media briefing about updates on COVID-19 situation, Joint Secretary in the Health Ministry Lav Agarwal claimed that India has been doing better than many other countries on the outcome ratio, which is the number of recoveries from coronavirus infection versus the number of deaths.
"If 80 per cent of the patients in India are recovering and in 20 per cent cases deaths are being reported, then by that standard India has been doing a little better than many other nations on the outcome ratio," he said.
"Before lockdown, the doubling rate of coronavirus cases was three days. Going by the number of cases in the last seven days, the doubling rate has been 6.2 days. In 19 states and Union Territories the doubling rate is less than the national average," he said.
The health ministry official also said the average growth factor of cases from April 1 has been 1.2, whereas in the preceding two weeks -- between March 15 and 31 -- it was 2.1, that is a decline of about 40 per cent.
This decline of 40 per cent was due to increase in testing, including that of cases with severe acute respiratory infections (SARI) and influenza-like illness (ILI), Agarwal said.
He also informed reporters that 1,919 dedicated COVID-19 hospitals and COVID health centres with a capacity of 1.73 lakh isolation beds and 21,800 ICU beds have been readied across the country till now.
Five lakh rapid antibody testing kits, which arrived from China on Thursday, are being distributed to states for districts with high burden of infection, he said, adding RT-PCR kits are being manufactured indigenously.
"We are aiming to make 10 lakh kits by the month of May. We are also working on rapid antibody test kits and by next month we will be able to make 10 lakh such kits," Agarwal said.
A capacity to manufacture 6,000 ventilators each month has been created at scientific institutes, he added.
Head of Epidemiology and Communicable Diseases at the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) Dr Raman R Gangakhedkar said 3,19,400 COVID-19 tests have been conducted so far in the country.
"Out of these, 28,340 tests were conducted on Thursday, of which 23,932 were done at 183 laboratories under ICMR network and the rest at 80 private labs," he said.
Responding to a question about private hospitals doing pool tests and under what conditions such tests are allowed, Dr Gangakhedkar said the ICMR has issued guidelines and recommended it for surveillance purpose.
"Wherever positivity rate is less than 2 per cent, five samples can be tested there together. Thus, by doing less tests we will get to know how much the infection is spreading," he said.
"In private hospitals, it (pool tests) is being done for individual diagnosis. Wherever five patients come together, their samples are tested together. If it comes out positive, then each sample is tested again individually. We had not recommended this for individual diagnosis since this may turn out to be costlier. Private hospitals should think over this," he said.
Gangakhedkar was asked about researchers at the Gujarat government-run Biotechnology Research Centre claiming success in decoding the entire genome sequence of the novel coronavirus and in identifying its three new mutations. They claim the findings will help in developing medicines or vaccines.
To this, Dr Gangakhedkar said decoding the whole genome sequence of the virus has not been done for the first time.
"People from different countries bring various virus species while travelling. We have seen presence of various species of the virus in our country.
"It will take some time for us to know the predominant quasi-species of novel coronavirus in the country. But mutations are not likely to make potential vaccines ineffective, as all sub-types of the virus have same enzymes and the virus does not mutate very fast," he said.
The ICMR official further said his organisation will conduct a study to find out the potential effect of BCG vaccine against COVID-19.
"Till the results of the study are out and evidence is obtained, we will not recommend the vaccine even to health workers," Dr Gangakhedkar said.
Agarwal said the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research, Department of Biotechnology, Department of Science and Technology and Department of Atomic Energy are working to increase testing capacity.
"Our focus is on developing new, rapid and accurate diagnostic testing kits which can give result in 30 minutes, innovative pooling strategies and indigenous synthesis of kits," he said.
"We are also working on viral sequencing to identify epidemiology and potentially important mutations. On the vaccine development front, we are working on inactivated virus and antibodies to make antigens and RNA-based vaccines," the joint secretary in the health ministry said.
He also informed reporters that India is working with global partners to develop effective vaccines.
"Though these are time-consuming efforts we are trying to speed up these processes," Agarwal said.
He further highlighted the need to work on developing effective drugs, saying there are several potential medicines, but no proven drug yet for the disease.
A task force of scientists are re-evaluating existing drugs so that they can be re-purposed for COVID-19 treatment, the health ministry official said.
