'Strict action if delay in reporting deaths': Delhi govt warns COVID-19 hospitals

With the Delhi government coming under attack over "under-reporting" of coronavirus deaths, the Delhi government on Sunday warned all COVID-19 hospitals and health facilities of strict action if there is a delay in reporting of coronavirus deaths.

Opposition political parties trained their guns at the AAP government over the exact figure of coronavirus deaths. Congress leader Ajay Maken asked the Arvind Kejriwal-led dispensation  "to be more transparent" in reporting cases of the disease. It was a "matter of shame" that Delhi was witnessing "a sorry state of affairs" in the fight against the pandemic, he said. Delhi BJP president Manoj Tiwari said the chief minister should clear the air about the situation. "Reports of under-reporting of coronavirus deaths are a matter of concern,'' Tiwari said. 

Responding to the discrepancies in COVID-19 death figures in the national capital, Health Minister Satyendar Jain said on Sunday that the mismatch is because several hospitals fail to send a detailed summary of deaths to the Delhi government.The government has now directed some hospitals to provide a detailed summary within 24 hours of the deaths to resolve the issue, Jain said.

"The daily summary about COVID-19 deaths is not being sent to the death audit committee because of which daily reports get delayed or are submitted with wrong details. Thus, the COVID-19 hospitals and health facilities have been warned of strict action if there is a delay in reporting of death cases," said the Delhi government in a statement.

"Many hospitals report deaths but do not send summaries. We have directed all hospitals to send detailed summaries within 24 hours of the occurrence of deaths," Jain told ANI."We have started releasing COVID-19 bulletins from 12 am to 12 am the next day. There used to be confusion over the timing of the bulletin. So now bulletin for the whole day will be released at once," Jain added.

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Delhi govt rubbishes under-reporting COVID deaths

On Saturday, Delhi Health Minister Satyendar Jain said not a single case will go unaccounted for as the state government has been accused of "under-reporting" COVID deaths. Confusion prevailed over the number of COVID-19 deaths in Delhi, with data from four hospitals showing that 92 people succumbed to the infection as against 68 reported by the government. Kejriwal has stated that 75% of Delhi's cases are asymptomatic.

Jain said the hospitals have not sent detailed death reports of patients which have information such reason of fatality, name, age and other things, on the basis of which COVID-19 health bulletin is updated. He said the health department has asked the hospitals to send death reports and summaries at the earliest, so that the data can be promptly added to the bulletin.

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Delhi's COVID statistics

Moreover, currently, Delhi's number of containment zones stands at 83, as four more areas were de-contained. While Delhi's active cases stand at 4781, the number of recovered persons stand at 2069. CM Kejriwal has allowed opening up all zones in Delhi as per MHA's directions, inspite of all 13 zones in Delhi being classified red stating, 'One must get used to living with Corona'.

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