Even as the total number of COVID-19 cases in Gujarat surpassed 8,000 mark and the number of deaths rose to 493, the state government on Sunday claimed that the recovery rate of patients has more than doubled in last 10 days.
The last 24 hours ending at 5 pm on Sunday saw an addition of 398 cases and the total reaching 8,195. The period also witnessed 21 deaths.
Principal Secretary, Health and Family Welfare, Jayanti Ravi, in one of her shortest virtual addresses to the media, claimed that as against the recovery rate that was 15.58 per cent on May 1, the recovery rate on Sunday was 32.64 per cent. She said as many as 454 patients have recovered and gone home so far.
Jayanti further claimed that the recovery rate in Gujarat is much higher than Punjab, West Bengal and Tamil Nadu.
In her brief address, which barely lasted for three minutes, she twice referred to the guidance given by Chief Minister Vijay Rupani and his deputy Nitin Patel, who is also the health minister. She said that this was possible because of the team work, and also thanked the police force.
However, Jayanti did not mention how many out of the 454 patients were discharged as per the new guidelines of discharge issued by the Centre. As per the new guidelines, asymptomatic patient can be discharged only after 10 days of admission and he or she should not have been suffering from fever for last three days before the discharge.
Neither she gave the break up of patients discharged as per the new guidelines, nor did the press release issued by the state government carry details about it.
On Saturday, a team of experts from New Delhi headed by AIIMS director Dr. Randeep Guleria had visited Ahmedabad to assist the state to control the number of cases and high mortality.