New Delhi: India’s Covid-19 effective reproduction number (R) — an indicator of how fast the infection is spreading within a population — has further increased to 1.06 this week from 1.02 last week.
This is concerning because any epidemic will continue growing as long as the R remains above 1.
At the beginning of the pandemic, India’s R for Covid-19 was 1.7, which increased to as high as 1.83 before it fell after the lockdown.
Around 24 September, the country’s R fell below 1 for the first time, dropping to 0.93. However, around 27 November, the R had briefly risen to 1.06.
Since then, the R value had been around 0.92 for several weeks. But last week, the value crossed 1 once again.
“The situation hasn’t improved this week,” Sitabhra Sinha, a researcher at Institute of Mathematical Sciences in Chennai, told ThePrint.
“In fact it is somewhat worse. Not only has R for India as a whole increased from 1.02 to 1.06, but also 11 out of the 16 states having the highest active cases now have R over 1,” said Sinha, who has been tracking the R values since the beginning of the pandemic.
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Highest R value recorded in Punjab
Eight of the 16 states with the highest number of active cases have R values over 1.
At present, Punjab has the highest R value among the states with the highest active cases. Last week, the state’s R value was 1.23, which has further increased to 1.32 this week.
The rise in cases in Punjab is of particular concern because the state also has the country’s highest Covid-19 mortality rate.
Haryana follows Punjab, with R at 1.29. Last week, the value was 1.16. Gujarat, too, has a high R value of 1.24, which increased from last week’s 1.14.
Madhya Pradesh’s R also increased to 1.23 this week from 1.14 last week.
Maharashtra, which is at present reporting the highest number of new Covid-19 cases, saw a slight drop in R value, even though it is still over 1. Last week, Maharashtra’s R was 1.18, which reduced to 1.14.
Karnataka, which has the third-highest number of active cases, saw its R value increase to 1.08 from around 1 last week.
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Kerala’s R below 1, Delhi has highest infection rate among cities
Kerala is among the few states which had R below 1, however there was a slight increase in the value to 0.89 this week from 0.87.
West Bengal, Tamil Nadu and Uttar Pradesh have R values at 0.97, 0.98 and 0.94 respectively. All three states saw an increase in their respective R values compared to last week.
Assam’s R value was close to 1 last week. It has dropped to 0.99 this week.
Delhi’s R has once again crossed 1 this week, with its R value at 1.26 — the highest among the major cities. Mumbai’s R value was 1.23 last week, which has dropped to 1.16. Similarly, Pune’s R value fell from 1.33 to 1.30.
Kolkata’s R was close to 1 last week but has now increased to 1.04. Bengaluru, which was at 1.07 last week, now has R at 1.12.
Chennai is the only major city where R is currently less than 1. Last week, the value was 1.11, which fell to 0.99 this week.
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