Coronavirus / There is no possibility of lockdown: Delhi Health Minister as cases rise

New Delhi: As daily new COVID-19 cases continue to surge in the national capital, Delhi Health Minister Satyendar Jain on Saturday said that lockdown is not a solution to deal with rising coronavirus infections.

"There is no possibility of lockdown. There has already been a lockdown and there was a logic behind it. At that time, no one knew how the virus spreads. It was then said that there is a 14-day cycle from being infected to ending the infection. Then the expert said that if all the activities are locked for 21 days, the virus will stop spreading. Even then the lockdown kept extending but despite this, the coronavirus spread did not stop. I think lockdown is not a solution," said Satyendar Jain.

"There were fewer cases earlier but it has increased now. So we have increased the number of testings and conducting 85,000-90,000 tests every day, which is more than 5 per cent of the national average. We are also doing contact tracing and isolation," he said.

He further said that there are sufficient beds in the hospital for COVID-19 patients.

"Hospitals have a sufficient number of beds as of now. The occupancy is around 20 per cent now, 80 per cent of the beds are unoccupied. We are monitoring this, if occupancy increases, we will increase the number of beds," the health minister added.

Delhi on Friday reported 1,534 new COVID-19 cases, 971 recoveries, and 9 deaths.

The total cases surged to 6,54,276 including 6,051 active cases and 6,37,238 total recoveries. However, the death toll touched 10,987 including the new deaths.

Delhi Disaster Management Authority (DDMA) said that amid rising COVID-19 cases in the NCT of Delhi, public celebrations for upcoming festivals such as Holi, Navratri and gatherings in general, should not be allowed.

The DDMA also said random testing (Rapid Antigen Test/RT-PCR) of passengers coming from other states where COVID-19 cases are increasing should be done all airports, railway stations, inter-state bust terminals, and other alighting points (for private buses).