Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal launched a new initiative under 'Delhi ki Yogshaala". (File)
Delhi residents who are under home isolation due to COVID-19 infection will now be able to learn Yoga asanas and pranayama (breathing exercises) virtually, Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal said today as he launched a new initiative under 'Delhi ki Yogshaala" amid rising coronavirus cases.
"Yoga boosts immunity..." the chief minister said, adding, "We have come up with a wonderful program for those who are in isolation... The Delhi government is starting a new initiative under 'Delhi ki Yogshaala' for the speedy recovery of all such Covid patients".
The online Yoga classes will begin Wednesday and trained instructors will conduct hour-long sessions in the mornings and evenings. "We will send them a link today and classes will begin from tomorrow in different batches," Mr Kejriwal added.
Amid rising Covid cases, largely driven by the Omicron variant, the Delhi government has imposed several restrictions such as closing dine-in facility in restaurants and making work-from-home mandatory for private offices, except for essential services.
Every fourth person getting tested in Delhi is turning out Covid positive -- the city recorded 19,166 cases on Monday.
However, the hospitalisation rate in Delhi remains low and most of the Covid positive patients are recovering in home isolation.
In what seems to be a one-of-a-kind initiative, Mr Kejriwal said the Delhi government has made arrangements to conduct online classes for up to 40,000 patients in home isolation. "I think this kind of program is happening for the first time... No one in the whole world is doing such a program for corona-infected home isolation patients," he added.
There will be a total of eight classes each day and patients can register for their chosen time slot.
Each class will comprise 15 patients and the participants can also interact with their instructors, the chief minister informed.
"For the last two-three days, the pace of increase of coronavirus cases in Delhi has slowed down. Hope it will decrease further and the trend will continue," the chief minister said.
Delhi Health Minister Satyendar Jain said on Monday that the city is likely to hit a peak of COVID-19 cases "definitely this week" and infections in the third wave may start falling after that.