Delhi’s bulletin adds 740 backlog cases from Safdarjung hospital in 2 days | Latest News Delhi - Hindustan Times
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Delhi’s bulletin adds 740 backlog cases from Safdarjung hospital in 2 days

By, Hindustan Times, New Delhi
Jun 24, 2021 03:50 AM IST

A Delhi government spokesperson said, “The hospitals in question are run by the central government. They directly upload Covid-19 data on the centralised portal. We have nothing to comment on this.”

The Capital added 477 backlog cases of Covid-19, or old infections that went unreported on previous days, to its tally on Wednesday — the second day in a row that such cases were added to the city’s records. On Tuesday, 263 infections from “earlier weeks” were added to the city’s Covid tally, said the government’s health bulletin.

As per the Delhi government’s health bulletin, Delhi on Tuesday and Wednesday added 111 and 134 new cases respectively.(Bloomberg)
As per the Delhi government’s health bulletin, Delhi on Tuesday and Wednesday added 111 and 134 new cases respectively.(Bloomberg)

The 740 backlog infections reported on these two days are originally from “May-end” in Vardhman Mahavir Medical College and the associated Safdarjung Hospital (both of which are run by the central government) that had not been updated in the national Covid-19 database due to “confusion” that stemmed from a senior official at the hospital having to quarantine, said senior hospital personnel who asked not to be named.

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A Delhi government spokesperson said, “The hospitals in question are run by the central government. They directly upload Covid-19 data on the centralised portal. We have nothing to comment on this.”

As per the Delhi government’s health bulletin, Delhi on Tuesday and Wednesday added 111 and 134 new cases respectively. The total number of confirmed cases in the city, after accounting for the corrections, stands at 1,433,366 as on Wednesday.

Officials familiar with the matter said Vardhaman Mahavir Medical College and Safdarjung Hospital did not report these cases to the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) due to “some confusion” when their microbiologist was under quarantine in May-end.

“The patients as well as the doctors were informed about their reports, but somehow the cases were not added to the ICMR portal,” the senior hospital personnel quoted above said. Once the data discrepancy was noted in the records, hospital officials said they informed the Union health ministry, ICMR and the Delhi government.

Officials, however, were unable to confirm whether more such cases will be added in the future.

Calls and messages from HT to Safdarjung Hospital spokesperson Poonam Dhanda on Wednesday enquiring about the discrepancy went unanswered.

Such statistical corrections are not uncommon in the country, particularly pertaining to infections during the brutal second wave where several states such as Maharashtra, Bihar, Uttarakhand and Punjab have been adding backlog cases and deaths in recent weeks that previously went unreported. However, the exercise generally implies that the numbers reported during the peak of the outbreak in these regions were under-reported.

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