New Delhi: For the first time since the pandemic broke out in the Capital and took hold, the city's active Covid-19 cases have come down to below 1,000 as the Delhi government on Sunday evening reported that the city now had 992 active infections.
The official health bulletin of the Delhi government on Sunday reported 94 new infections in the last 24 hours, that came out of 75,133 tests — leading to a daily positivity rate of around 0.13 per cent. The positivity rate in the city has been consistently hovering around 0.1 per cent for the last few weeks.
This comes weeks after the city waned off a brutal wave of infections that peaked in April and May, which ended up taking the Capital's healthcare to the brink of collapse. In the middle of the brutal wave — Delhi's fourth and the country's second, the Capital was faced with an acute shortage of medical oxygen along with medicines and other medical essentials.
And as a result of this shortage, scores of hospitals sent out SOS messages for oxygen, and several also reported losing patients to this shortage.
The national Capital has recorded 14,34,554 COVID-19 cases since the pandemic began last year. So far, over 14.08 lakh patients have recovered, the bulletin said.
The death toll stands at 24,995, it said.
On Saturday, Delhi had recorded 86 cases with a positivity rate of 0.11 per cent and five deaths. On Friday, the city saw 93 cases with a positivity rate of 0.13 per cent and two deaths. The city had reported 59 COVID-19 cases, the lowest so far this year, and two deaths on Monday.
According to covid19India.org, Delhi had recorded 17 cases on April 15 last year.
The bulletin said 75,133 tests, including 52,856 RT-PCR tests, were conducted the previous day.
Delhi faced a brutal second wave of the pandemic that claimed a large number of lives daily. The rapid rise in the number of cases led to a shortage of medical oxygen at various city hospitals.
On April 20, the city had reported a record 28,395 cases. On April 22, the case positivity rate was 36.2 per cent, the highest so far. At 448, the highest number of deaths was reported on May 3.
There are 300 people under home isolation in Delhi while the number of containment zones stands at 701, the bulletin said.