Coronavirus cases in the city of Mumbai are increasing exponentially, and officials from the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), in mid-August, conducted the second phase of SERO survey to understand the prevalence of infection amongst the people in slums and non-slum pockets of Mumbai.
The results for the same were revealed recently, and as per reports, 45 per cent of people living in the slums and around 18 per cent living in non-slum areas are exposed to coronavirus, infection. Experts claim that the results of the second round are different in comparison to the one received post the first round of survey conducted in July.
Officials from the Municipal Corporation, in July, August and September, collected samples from the slum and non-slum pockets form wards F-North, R-North and M-West areas of the western suburbs.
A total of 6.936 samples out of 8,870 were tested in the first round, however, 5,384 samples were collected in the second round of the survey. Further, 728 people were involved in compiling the samples.
In comparison, the first phase of the survey, 57 per cent of the samples showed that the people from the slums and 16 per cent from the non-slum areas had antibodies against the virus. This was different in comparison to the second survey, where officials found an increase in the number of antibodies in people from the non-slum Pockets, but the figures had dropped for the samples tested from the slums.
This data has increased concerns for the officials from the municipal corporation, as it infers that the people in the slums are prone to infection. Keeping this in mind, officials will have to impose strict rules and guidelines.
Experts claim that the drop could be due to a few reasons, as the second phase of the survey might have been conducted from areas with reduced COVID cases, in comparison to the previous survey. Furthermore, the antibodies could have started decaying, a few months later, as the cases in slums were identified in the earlier COVID19 months of March and April. However, these are assumptions, and cannot be considered as strong reasons.
Data released by the state health department shows that, as of October 2, 2020, Mumbai had a total of 2,10,060 cases and 9014 deaths. Maharashtra had more than 14,00,000 coronavirus cases. CM Uddhav Thackeray-led government announced another phase of lockdown until October 31, 2020. However, some activities in the state will resume under the unlock 5.0 guidelines. These have been permitted keeping the strict guidelines and SOPs in mind.
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