India’s R value remains steady at 0.92 this week, but many states see a rise in infection rate

Tamil Nadu, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Punjab and Delhi saw an increase in their R values this week.

A medic conducts a Covid-19 swab test in Punjab (representational image) | PTI

New Delhi: India’s effective reproduction number (R) for Covid-19 — an indicator of how fast the infection is spreading — remained the same as last week, at 0.92.

The overall R value has been steady for India since the past several weeks. The R value needs to remain under 1 for a pandemic to come to an end.

Kerala, which currently has the highest number of active cases, saw a decline in the R value for the second week consecutively. Last week, the R was at 0.99, but the value dropped to 0.94 this week.

Sitabhra Sinha, a researcher at Institute of Mathematical Sciences in Chennai, told ThePrint that the case count in Maharashtra, the state with the second highest number of active cases, has been fluctuating to arrive at a robust estimate of R. However, Sinha estimated that the value remains much lower than 1.

Meanwhile, Karnataka, West Bengal and Uttar Pradesh — the top five states in terms of active cases — have R values the same as last week, at 0.89, 0.91 and 0.83 respectively.

States with rising R values

Several states have reported an increase in their R values. For example, Tamil Nadu’s R went up from 0.90 last week to 0.97 this week.

“Although still less than 1, this may make Tamil Nadu go to a higher rank next week in terms of active cases,” Sinha told ThePrint.

Similarly, Gujarat also saw a rise in its R value to 0.77 this week from 0.69 last week. Madhya Pradesh’s R increased to 0.82 this week from 0.63 last week.

Punjab, the state which has the highest Covid-19 mortality rate among Indian states, also saw its R value go up to nearly 1 this week from 0.90 last week.

Delhi’s R too rose slightly, from 0.74 last week to 0.75 this week.

Major cities

Mumbai saw a rise in its R to 0.95 this week from 0.86 last week. Bengaluru also saw a rising R value — to 0.88 this week from 0.73 last week.

Meanwhile, the R value of Pune was at 1.08 last week and has now dropped to just below 1 this week. Chennai and Kolkata have R values the same as last week, at 0.91 and 0.96 respectively.