Hospitalisations, cases dip; schools set to reopen

The state government has sought to assuage the concerns voiced by the section of parents who fear the risk of infection

Mumbai With the state ready to open schools from Monday, the state continued to witness a drop in hospitalisation and a fall in cases in urban areas. However, the state continued to report a daily caseload of over 40,000 at 40,805 on Sunday.

Barring a few districts like Pune, Aurangabad and Ahmednagar, schools in most parts of the state are scheduled to reopen on Monday (Vijay Bate)

Barring a few districts like Pune, Aurangabad and Ahmednagar, schools in most parts of the state are scheduled to reopen on Monday.

The state government has sought to assuage the concerns voiced by the section of parents who fear the risk of infection. State environment Minister and Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray’s son Aaditya Thackeray stated that there was no compulsion to send their wards to schools.

“It is on the parents to decide whether they want to send their wards to school or not. Those who feel it is risky, should not send their children. The schools are starting and it is now on both the school management and parents to decide on the future course of action,” he added.

He said that schools have been closed for more than 700 days and the reopening is looked at as the beginning of the reopening activities after partial curbs were imposed in the first week of January.

According to the weekly report presented by the state government, the number of hospital admissions has decreased to 20,552 on January 18 from 29,110 on January 10. The number of patients dependent on liquid oxygen outside the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) has decreased to 3,749 from 3,900 during the same period.

Dr Wiqar Shaikh, professor of medicine, Grant Medical College and Sir JJ Hospital lauded the step. “Parents should not be worried about sending their children to school. They should not panic as Covid is here to stay and we need to learn to live with the virus. Students have suffered a lot in the last two years as online education is a very poor alternative to physically attending school,” said Shaikh.

Maharashtra reported no new case of Omicron variant on Sunday. The total number of Omicron cases reached 2,759. So far, 1,437 cases have been discharged following a negative RT-PCR test.

On Sunday, Maharashtra reported 44 fatalities, pushing the toll to 1,42,115. The positivity rate stood at 20.89 % as 40,805 cases were recorded of the total 1,95,256 tests. Mumbai logged in 2,550 new cases with 13 deaths, taking the total cases tally to 10,33,915.

The active cases in the state stood at 2,93,305, in which Pune leads with 89,673 cases followed by Thane and Mumbai with 38,597 and 19,808 respectively. The toll stood at 1,42,115, with Pune leading with 19,923, followed by Mumbai with 16,535 and Thane with 11,669.