The spread of the novel coronavirus began in the month of March in Mumbai. The city witnessed a big spike in cases in the months of May, June and July. The prevalence of the deadly virus in Mumbai is now slowly declining. However, the same cannot be said about the neighbouring areas of the city. Areas of Thane, Kalyan-Dombivali, Vasai-Virar, Navi Mumbai, Panvel and Mira-Bhayandar have witnessed a rapid rise in COVID-19 cases in the last two months.
Since June 8, the state government introduced 'Mission Begin Again', in order to relax the state-wide lockdown restrictions. But easing the lockdown only created more problems for the areas under the Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR). In the first 15 days of July around 2,624 cases were reported in the Mira-Bhayandar area.
In Navi Mumbai, the number of COVID-19 related cases and deaths have seen a sharp increase after relaxing the lockdown. In just one month, the death rate in Navi Mumbai went up from 3.13 per cent to 3.26 per cent. When the lockdown was eased in June, people started stepping out of their homes without proper preventive items like masks and also failed to follow the social distancing rules. As a result, in the period of June 9 to July, the number of cases jumped from 3,063 to 8,518. In other words, the number of infected patients in Navi Mumbai increased by 5,455 in a month. On average, about 200 new patients were recorded on a daily basis for a month.
Following this development, a lockdown was imposed in Navi Mumbai. However, so far there has been no or little decline in the number of cases in the region. On July 1, Navi Mumbai had a total of 6,823 cases. The number of cases increased to 13,220 by July 25. This means that during this period, the average number of patients in Navi Mumbai increased by 255 per day.
A strict lockdown was imposed on Thane district from the period between July 2 to July 19. However, during this period, Thane district recorded 32,943 new coronavirus cases. A large number of cases were reported in the areas of Thane, Kalyan, Dombivali, Navi Mumbai, Mira Bhayander, Thane Rural, Ambernath and Badlapur in the district. Despite a complete lockdown, the number of cases did not see a decline in the district. In order to curb the spread of the virus, a lockdown has again been extended till July 31 in these areas.
The number of patients in the cities from the period of July 2 to July 19 :
Kalyan-Dombivali 8,982
Thane 6,578
Navi Mumbai 4,603
Ulhasnagar 3,544
Meera Bhayander 3,251
Ambarnath 1,244
Badlapur 1,119
Bhiwandi 1,073
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