Excerpts of the Press Briefing on the actions taken, preparedness and updates on COVID-19 :

• Total #COVID19 cases – 29,435.
  People under active medical supervision – 21,632.
  In last 24 hours – 1,543 new cases,
  684 recoveries, Total recoveries – 6,868, Recovery rate – 23.3%, a progressive increase.
• There are 17 districts now where no new #COVID19 case has been reported in the last 28 days (2 districts added and 1 district dropped from this list)
• .@ICMRDELHI has stated very clearly that there is no approved therapy for COVID19, including Plasma Therapy. This is in experimental stage, there is no evidence to use this as treatment. ICMR is studying the efficacy of this therapy.
• There can even be life-threatening complications if Plasma Therapy is not used as per guidelines. Until and unless this is approved as a therapy for COVID19, it is unjustified to spread any claim about the effectiveness of this therapy.
• Globally, no. of cases of COVID19 reinfection is very minuscule, hence, in absence of conclusive evidence, we have to surely consider that those patients who have been certified as cured as per RT-PCR – the gold standard for COVID19 – are perfectly alright.
• The doubling time of COVID19 cases in India was ~3 – 3.25 days before lockdown, now it is around 10.2 days. This is mainly because of our focus on containment, physical distancing and lockdown measures.
• If a COVID19 patient is found to be infected at any health facility, the facility can be reused after proper disinfection procedures. Similarly, workplaces too where positive patients were found can be used after proper disinfection is done.