India between Stage 2 and 3: Gearing up for worst-case scenario, ICMR to scale up testing, India has finally said it is between Stage two and stage three of the COVID-19 outbreak, as the number of cases rises rapidly. 

Lav Agarwal, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW), said there is localized community transmission in India, and that the country is between two stages, which implies that the government is unable to confirm the source of infection for all cases.

According to the WHO definition followed by India, Stage 2 is local transmission, Every person who comes in contact with the infected can be traced and isolated.

AIIMS Director Dr. Randeep Guleria, who is also a member of a Task Force on COVID-19, on Monday reportedly said that “localized community transmission” has been seen in some pockets and that India is between Stage 2 (local transmission) and Stage 3. 

Explaining further, Agarwal(Joint Secretary, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare ) said that they go for a cluster containment strategy when limited cases are reported from a particular area while the government’s action and intervention get intensified when larger number of cases are reported. “We (Agrawal ) tell you every time that if there will be a community transmission we will be the first one to tell you so that everyone gets alert. If we go by the wordings (of AIIMS Director), he said localized community transmission, which implies a larger number of cases are being found in a particular area.

In addition to this, the joint secretary also added that ”As we are in between Stage 2 and 3 and that implies that our efforts and actions should be focused on ensuring we do not shift to stage 3, also there are clearly defined strategies for containment in areas reporting a larger number of cases and the government was working according to that.

 

What is Stage 2(COVID-19)

In Stage 2, disease transmission is limited to those with travel history to affected countries or those in contact with the infected persons.

What is Stage 3(COVID-19)

Community transmission or Stage 3 means a patient is infected though he had no known contact with another confirmed case of COVID-19 or traveled from a country affected by the pandemic.

In India, Confirmed cases among men are higher, and so are the deaths, with men accounting for 73 percent of deaths.

47 percent of cases in the country have been confirmed in persons less than 40 years and only 7 percent of deaths have occurred in that age group.

“Patients who died showed signs of fever, cough, breathlessness, sore throat, headache and, in some cases, crepitation, which is crackling sounds made by lungs by popping open of small airways, when they are filled with fluid.

Some patients had underlying diseases like high blood pressure, diabetes, heart disease or kidney ailments,” said a health official, requesting anonymity.