Fact check: Is Delhi govt giving right statistics on COVID-19 cases

New Delhi, Nov 19: The number of COVID-19 cases in Delhi have shot up and this led to the High Court hitting out at the government over the delay in bringing measures to check the spread.

On November 18, Delhi reported 7,486 new COVID-19 cases taking the national capital's tally to over 5 lakh. 131 fatalities, the highest single day death death count till date pushed the toll to 7,493, a bulletin issued by the Delhi government said.

With the added problem of air pollution, the situation has become so concerning that the Centre too had to step in.

This being said the Shaheed Bhagat Singh Sewa Dal, which has in fact ensured dignity in death of all those who lost their lives due to COVID-19 says that the Delhi government is misreporting the numbers.

The NGO, which had flagged concerns few months back on the situation now says that the people were dead on the streets with none to cremate them. The COVID-19 wave is now extreme and it is worse in November when compared to what it was when it first broke out.

The figures that the government is giving is wrong. Many people are dying in their homes and we are getting the bodies of those dying in home isolation for cremation.

The issue relating to misreporting the COVID-19 numbers had cropped up in July too. A Sero-surveillance study that was conducted by the National Center for Disease Control in collaboration with the Delhi government suggested that the total COVID cases in Delhi are much higher than what the records show.

23.48 per cent people had already contracted the virus by July 10. However, Delhi government data shows that total positive cases by July 10 were 1,09,140. If the approximate population of Delhi is 3 crore, then the total population infected by July 10 was only 0.36 per cent.

When comparing the survey data to the actual number of COVID-19 cases, one can conclude that the infection was 65.22 per cent times more than what the government had recorded.