Amid concerns over Kerala reporting high number of fresh COVID-19 cases for weeks — over 20,000 every day for the past five days — an analysis of the Union government’s ICMR's (Indian Council of Medical Research) fourth sero-survey found that the state detects the most number of cases in all of India. In other words, Kerala has the least underreporting of COVID-19 cases — one in every six cases is detected, as opposed to Uttar Pradesh, which underreports the most, with only one in 98 cases detected.
Independent epidemiologist Dr Chandrakanth Lahariya analysed the ICMR survey to conclude that for every COVID-19 case reported in India, there were 30 cases that remained undetected. He shared his analysis on Twitter, clarifying that it does not mean the underreporting was deliberate but simply reflects the performance of the disease surveillance system and the response to pandemic in the respective state.
"Many cases are asymptomatic so they are likely to go unreported. If contact tracing is done well, even asymptomatic cases can also be reported. This has been reflected in the fact that a few states have done better than others as they can report on more cases as compared to other states," Lahariya told PTI.
Among states and union territories, the analysis by Lahariya showed that Uttar Pradesh missed the highest number of cases. With every case reported in that state, 98 cases were missed or remained undetected. The under-counting factor was lowest for Kerala at 6 which means for every case reported six cases were missed, according to the analysis. For Madhya Pradesh, the under-counting factor was 83 — highest after Uttar Pradesh followed by Jharkhand at 63, Rajasthan at 62, Gujarat at 61 and Bihar at 59.
In seroprevalence — the percentage of population with antibodies after being infected by the virus — Kerala is at the bottom of the chart with 44.4% while Madhya Pradesh leads it with 79%. This means that Kerala, despite its high number of COVID-19 cases, still has the least number of people infected by the novel coronavirus.
On Saturday, Kerala recorded 20,624 fresh cases of COVID-19, taking the active cases in the state to 1.64 lakh. State Health Minister Veena George said that Kerala is not yet free from the second wave of COVID-19 and people should be extra cautious to prevent a third wave. At a meeting to review the state's preparedness to handle a third wave, the minister said that about half of the population in Kerala was susceptible to the virus. The state has been doing massive vaccinations, breaking its own record of administering several lakh doses on a single day in the past weeks. On Friday alone, 5.06 lakh doses of COVID-19 vaccination were administered in the state. About 17% of the population has received both the doses, which is much higher than the national average.
A few days ago, senior virologist Gagandeep Kang said in an interview to Karan Thapar for The Wire that Kerala's sensible strategy helped control the spread of the disease.
(With PTI inputs)