Anantnag: Not only are the daily Covid cases reported in Jammu and Kashmir spiralling down in recent days, the positivity rate of the Covid tests conducted daily has also dropped substantially and is now a little lower than what it was at the beginning of January.
There has been a considerable decrease in the hospitalisation rate across Jammu and Kashmir as well.
On February 20, the total number of daily cases detected came out to be only 151, out of 67,209 tests conducted in the past 24 hours by the administration.
“The figures mean we had a test positivity rate of only 0.22 percent,” an official, privy to data on Covid-19, told Kashmir Reader. “This is lower than the test positivity rate of 4.5 percent in the middle of January.”
The official said that the positivity rate has gone down even lower than what it was on January 1, when Covid numbers had been even fewer than they are now. “The decrease has been gradual. On February 15 the positivity rate was 0.48 percent, and has been tumbling ever since,” the official said.
After a sudden and serious upsurge in January, wherein more than 94,000 fresh infections were reported and 146 people lost their lives, February has been a breather with lower numbers and lesser people dying of the infection.
“We have witnessed only around 16,800 new infections this month even as 72 people have died across Jammu and Kashmir,” the official said, adding, “Yes, the death rate this month is higher than what it was in January, but then the numbers are low, which is good news.”
January had a death rate of 0.15 percent, while it is 0.42 percent in the present month.
With lower numbers, the hospitalisation rate has also come down. At present there are only 64 people admitted in hospitals for Covid, against a total capacity of 4,838 dedicated beds.
The numbers suggest that the hospital bed occupancy rate is only 1.32 percent. “If we look at the numbers from January, we had a bed occupancy rate of more than 7 percent in the middle of the month. This means we are winning the war on this front as well,” the official said.
Srinagar district in Kashmir and Jammu district in the Jammu division continue to be the worst affected districts, still. Out of the 7,937 fresh infections recorded in the Jammu division in February, 3,446 or 43.4 percent have been reported from Jammu district alone.
“Jammu district also reported 17 deaths, a major chunk of the total 39 deaths reported from the division,” the official said.
In Srinagar district, 3,026 fresh infections have been reported in February, which is 33.8 percent of the total 8,944 infections recorded in Kashmir division. Srinagar however has reported only 7 deaths, out of a total of 33 reported across 10 districts of Kashmir valley.

Suhail A Shah