Delhi Reports 805 New COVID-19 Cases, Lowest In Over 2 Months

The national capital recorded 805 fresh coronavirus cases on Monday, the lowest in over two months, taking the infection tally to 1,38,482, authorities said on Monday.

According to a health bulletin, 10,133 tests -- 3,904 RTCPR and 6,229 Rapid Antigen -- were conducted in the last 24 hours.

On an average, 18,000-19,000 tests were being conducted daily since testing was ramped up significantly in mid-June.

The number of tests conducted a day before was also low -- 12,730 -- due to Eid al-Adha. So far, 10,73,802 tests have been conducted in Delhi, the bulletin said.

On May 27, the count of fresh cases stood at 792. A day after, the figure went up to 1,024. Since then the national capital had witnessed a spurt in COVID-19 cases till a few days back when the numbers started declining.

With the 805 fresh cases on Monday, the infection tally climbed to 1,38,482 in the national capital. With 17 fatalities, the deaths mounted to 4,021, according to the bulletin.

There are 10,207 active cases, the health bulletin said. The recovery rate and the positivity rate stand at 89.72 per cent and 7.94 per cent respectively. The bulletin said 5,577 people are recovering in home isolation.

Delhi has recorded a steady decline in active cases.

The R-value, or reproduction number, for COVID-19 has fallen below one in Delhi, Mumbai and Chennai, indicating a slowdown in the spread of the disease in three of India's biggest cities, according to a recent study.

A modelling study published in the journal Statistics & Applications found the current R-value for Delhi is 0.66 while it is 0.81 for Mumbai and 0.86 for Chennai, lower than the national average of 1.16.

R-value is the number of people getting infected by an already infected person on an average. Andhra Pradesh has the highest R-value of 1.48 in the entire country right now.

Explaining the Delhi figure of 0,66 to illustrate the concept, Sitabhra Sinha, professor of physics at the Institute of Mathematical Sciences (IMSc) in Chennai who led the study, said this means every group of 100 infected persons in the city can currently pass on the infection to another 60 people on an average.

"Continuation of such a low value of R in a community implies that the current wave of the pandemic is on the decline and could be brought under control in the near future with continued containment measures," said Dibyendu Nandi, professor of physics at Kolkata''s Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER).

"Typically an effective reproduction number, i.e., R-value lower than one implies that an infected person, on average, is spreading the infection to at most one person," he explained.

After the Delhi government revised the containment zone policy last week, their number stands at 496 now.

In a related development, Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal handed over a cheque of Rs 1 crore to the family of Joginder Chaudhary, the 27-year-old dead junior resident doctor of Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar Hospital. 

Chaudhary died due to COVID-19 last month.

"Our Corona Warrior Dr. Joginder Chaudhary, posted in Delhi Government Hospital, served the patients by putting his life at stake. Dr. Chaudhary had passed away recently due to corona infection, today I met his family and handed over a cheque of Rs. 1 crore as financial assistance. Will help the family in every possible way," the chief minister tweeted.