In COVID chart, is Odisha going the Kerala way?

Bhubaneswar: In the COVID chart, Odisha seems going the Kerala way. It seems the novel coronavirus is apparently scoring briskly in the State. Like, Kerala, which took 56 days to touch 100 mark and grew faster thereafter, after taking nearly 40-days to score a century in Odisha, COVID now is scoring faster in the State.

The COVID rate per day in Odisha now is  around 7 cases vis-a-vis nearly 2-3 cases per day earlier.  This shows the per day case rate in Odisha has almost doubled now.

Consider the uncanny similarities between Kerala and Odisha. Post taking a longer period to touch 100 in Kerala, COVID scored at a brisk rate there to add another 270 positives in just 18 days (Mar 25-April 12). And this swift rise happened in Kerala owing to influx of migrants from Europe and Gulf countries.

The COVID scoring rate in Odisha progresses almost in a similar fashion. COVID took 40 -long days to touch 100 count, but in just around 6-days time,  Odisha added nearly 45 more cases. The State health department has attributed the high growth in COVID cases to migrants returned from West Bengal. Nearly half of the COVID positive cases are returnees from West Bengal, informed State Health Department.

How April boosted COVID count in Odisha is evidenced from the fact that cases in Odisha have gone up by a massive 3,475 per cent in April. And in tandem to the giant rise in cases, COVID tests done in the State have also grown up by a humongous 5,496 per cent.

The above numerical analysis, however, gives a lone comfort factor for the State: COVID spike rate is way below the COVID test growth rate.

Two factors gave a booster dose to COVID count in Odisha: Tablighi cluster and Odia returnees from West Bengal.

As per the trend observed today, COVID is all set to migrate from high burden states to Odisha. For instance, two returnees from Tamil Nadu tested positive in Balangir today. Reports show nearly 2-dozen Surat returnees in Ganjam exhibit flu-like symptoms.

In the given  context, and taking into account the current compounded growth rate of around 7 per cent per day, the COVID cases in the State may touch the 200 mark in May first week itself.   

Moreover, like in Kerala, COVID is seen annexing new districts in Odisha. After Deogarh and Keonjhar, COVID sets its foot in Balangir today.

How swift is the COVID growth in Odisha can well be ascertained from another numerical fact.

COVID took 27 long days to score the 50- count. In another 15 days, the virus scored the 2nd 50 score to take the tally above 100. Perking up the scoring rate further, it seems the virus is about to score the 3rd fifty in just 6 days to cross the 150-mark. The positive count touched 154 on May 1.

But the comfort statistics is Odisha's case load proportion is on the downhill.  Case load means proportion of active cases in total confirmed cases.

Sample this. The case load percentage in the first 50 cases in the State stood at 74. The proportion went down to 66 per cent when Odisha recorded its 100th COVID case. Now, when the COVID count is almost around 150, the case load percentage has dropped to around 62 per cent. The reason: 55 positives in  the State have recovered so far.

However, in recovery rate, Odisha is positioned at 17th - the same position the state holds in COVID confirmed cases ranking nationally.