Mumbai: Is Dharavi Really Now A COVID-Free Zone?

In a welcoming news, Mumbai’s one of the biggest slum area, Dharavi reported zero active coronavirus cases for the first time.

It was popularly known that Dharavi was one of Mumbai’s worst affected COVID-19 hotspots at the beginning of the pandemic. For those unversed, the slum reported its first ever case on April 1, 2020.

Though, several times earlier Dharavi had recorded zero fresh cases in the past. So far, this slum has recorded a total of 8,652 COVID-19 cases.

If reports are to be believed, Dharavi’s first case also became the first death due to COVID-19. After April 1, 2020, it took 17 days for this slum pocket to record the first 100 cases, six days to record the next 100, and only five days to record 100 more.

With this, on April 17, Dharavi managed to record a total of 101 positive cases. This figure doubled by April 23, when Dharavi recorded 214 cases. By the end of April 2020, Dharavi had recorded around 340 cases.

Therefore, looking at the graph and pace of spread of the infection, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) launched ‘Mission Dharavi’ within the first 15 days of the first wave. This included 4Ts - tracing, tracking, testing, and treating and hospitalisation or quarantining of its positive patients.

During the second, exactly a year after, in April 2021, the highest number of daily cases recorded in Dharavi was 99, in April 2021. By mid-May 2021, the cases in a single day began to drop again. However, the officials attribute this to the vaccination.

Meanwhile, civic officials improved upon its Mission Dharavi model in the third wave to make the slum COVID-free, and took a three-point approach to contain cases in this slum pocket, which included fever camps, disinfection of public premises, and speeding up of vaccination.

Now, as the coronavirus pandemic enters its third year, it would be legitimate to say that the civic body has achieved its target to make Dharavi slum a COVID-free zone.

On the other hand, Mumbai on Thursday, March 24, saw a slight spike in the daily cases at 54. Besides, the city has been reporting zero COVID-linked deaths since the past few weeks consecutively, which is another sign of waning the novel virus.