Social gatherings in festivities, poor air quality among reasons for COVID cases rise in Delhi: Govt

New Delhi, Oct 29: Social gatherings during festivities, deteriorating air quality, increasing incidences of respiratory disorders are among a few reasons attributed to the rise in COVID-19 cases in Delhi, the Union Health Ministry said on Thursday.

A review meeting on the status of the infection in Delhi, West Bengal and Kerala was held by Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan in the presence of V K Paul, Member (Health), NITI Aayog, and Balram Bhargava, DG, ICMR, according to a statement by the health ministry.

Delhi with 29,378 active cases has recorded nearly 46 per cent increase in the fresh cases over the past four weeks, and the positivity rate over the past four weeks has escalated by nearly 9 per cent, the ministry said.

"The rising cases were attributed by the Delhi team to social gatherings during the festivities, deteriorating air quality, increasing incidences of respiratory disorders and clusters of positive cases at work places. The fatigue among frontline workers was also discussed," it said.

The union territory was advised to aggressively ramp up testing, increase RT-PCR tests, focus on contact tracing and effectively enforce isolation of the traced contacts within the first 72 hours. It was advised to focus on containment zones, and strict perimeter control to be implemented as per the home ministry guidelines.

The health authorities were advised to give additional thrust to Information, Education and Communication (IEC) practices and proactively promote wearing of masks and other COVID appropriate behaviours, the ministry said.