Modi's 19-day COVID-19 Challenge: Will country make corona graph flat?

Bhubaneswar: After 21-days lockdown, the country gets nineteen more days to rein in the rising novel coronavirus graph in the country. The Covid-19 is seemingly on the surge mode. Cases of coronavirus took a long jump of 1,988 per cent during the lockdown 1.0.

Will the corona graph in the country levels off in the coming 19-days? In India's fight against corona, the month of April proved a double dampener for the country. Not only the positive cases have started spiralling up, but the death toll has also mounted up.

As per the data available with Union Health Ministry, during the period of April 1-13, the country has recorded a whopping 84 per cent of the total Covid-19 positive cases in the country. The total new positives detected during the period in the country stood at a high of 8,726, when the total positives till date stood at 10,363.

Similarly, the total fatalities during the period has been a massive 90 per cent of the total Covid-19 toll in the country till date. The total toll during the period stood at 307, whereas the total mortality count till date stood at 339.

A look at the Union Health Ministry data reveals that a total of 7 states are the major driving force behind the Covid-19 positives in the country. They are: Delhi, Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Telangana and Uttar Pradesh.

Among the seven states, a volcanic growth is seen in two states namely Delhi and Tamil Nadu, where the Covid-19 cases are doubling at the rate of every 3-days.

There are another set of four states, Maharashtra, UP, Telangana and Rajasthan, which see doubling of novel coronavirus cases every 5-days.

Among the high-burden states, only Kerala is seeing its Covid-19 graph levelling off.  The Covid-19 footprint is now seen in as many as 354 districts in the country, up from 132 districts on March 31. This shows the infection has grown to 222 districts within span of April 1-10.

The disconcerting numbers emerged yesterday (April 13) is the country saw it single-day reporting of largest number of cases. A total of 1,211 positives were detected on April 13.

In the backdrop of scary numbers, are there any green shoots that show the 19-day challenge is achievable?

A look at the graph of daily infections give some hope. The graph shows since April 8, the new infections number have reached a plateau, except for a spike on April 13.

The hurdles on the path of stabilisation is consistency in new cases elude the country as on today (see the image above).