COVID-19 not airborne, says ICMR’s top scientist

New Delhi, Apr 05: With the number of coronavirus cases in India now doubling in just over four days, the Indian Council of Medical Research on Sunday confirmed that COVID-19 is not an airborne infection.

"If this were an airborne and not droplet infection, every person in a family would be infected. Same would apply for other patients in a hospital," said Raman R Gangakhedkar, head of Epidemiology and Communicable diseases at ICMR.

The WHO had confirmed that the coronavirus is not airborne. As the virus spreads through the droplets generated from an infected person, there were doubts regarding the virus being airborne.

Recent WHO reports confirm that the droplets are too heavy to hang in the air and can quickly fall onto the surface, eradicating the false and confusing claims.

Coronavirus spreads primarily through droplets generated when an infected person coughs or sneezes, or through droplets of saliva or discharge from the nose.

On Sunday, the number of coronavirus cases in India climbed to 3,374 and seventy nine people have lost their lives so far while 267 people have recovered, Lav Aggarwal, joint secretary, health ministry said at the briefing.