COVID-19 India Updates April 24: 23,452 Cases, Doubling In 10 Days | Read Highlights

NEW DELHI: The government said on Friday said that the rate at which COVID-19 cases is doubling in India now stands at 10 days. The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, in its update at 5 pm, said that the total number of COVID-19 cases in India stood at 23,452, while 4,814 people have recovered from coronavirus. The death toll stood at 723.

Here are the highlights of the government's press briefing held to appraise on COVID-19 situation in the country.

· In last 28 days, as many as 15 districts have had no new case.

· 80 districts have not reported any new coronavirus case in the last 14 day, says Lav Agarwal, Health, Joint Secretary.

· Lockdown has been effective in slowing the rate at which COVID-19 cases is doubling in India, and it now stands at 10 days, says Niti Ayog member V K Paul and chairman of Empowered Group One.

· If we go back to March 21, the cases were doubling in around three days. An important turn came on March 23 after the Janata Curfew had happened. The direction changed and the doubling rate increased to five. By then, we had already put in place travel restrictions and had created an environment of social distancing. There were some disturbances in between and we went back a little. But from April 6, the doubling time started improving, he says.

· The curve has begun to flatten. Had we not taken the decision of clamping the nationwide lockdown, we would have had around 1 lakh COVID-19 cases by now, as per a reasonable estimate. Now, the outbreak is under control, Paul says.

· Surveillance, key in COVID-19 fight, says S K Singh, Director of National Centre for Disease Control.

· Around 9.45 lakh suspected coronavirus cases are under the surveillance network at present and upon detection of symptoms of the infection, samples are taken from these people for testing.

· Surveillance network has been set up at district level as well, so that household survey, quarantine and isolation are done as part of cluster containment plan.

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