India reported almost 45 million cases of the coronavirus (COVID-19) as of October 20, 2023, with more than 44 million recoveries and about 532 thousand fatalities. The number of cases in the country had a decreasing trend in the past months.

Burden on the healthcare system

With the world's second largest population in addition to an even worse second wave of the coronavirus pandemic seems to be crushing an already inadequate healthcare system. Despite vast numbers being vaccinated, a new variant seemed to be affecting younger age groups this time around. The lack of ICU beds, black market sales of oxygen cylinders and drugs needed to treat COVID-19, as well as overworked crematoriums resorting to mass burials added to the woes of the country. Foreign aid was promised from various countries including the United States, France, Germany and the United Kingdom. Additionally, funding from the central government was expected to boost vaccine production.

Situation overview
Even though days in April 2021 saw record-breaking numbers compared to any other country worldwide, a nation-wide lockdown has not been implemented. The largest religious gathering - the Kumbh Mela, sacred to the Hindus, along with election rallies in certain states continue to be held. Some states and union territories including Maharashtra, Delhi, and Karnataka had issued curfews and lockdowns to try to curb the spread of infections.

In October 2020, Tripura recorded the highest COVID-19 deaths per million people compared to to other states and Union territories with 77 deaths. Uttarakhand followed with over 71 deaths per million people.

Indicators such as case fatality and doubling time are used to measure the spread of the disease. The total deaths per million is considered to be a good indicator, to better measure and understand, the efficacy of the measures undertaken to control the spread of the virus. A slacked increase along with a fall in the number of new deaths per day is suggestive of a good control indicator.

The Indian state of Punjab reported the highest number of active coronavirus (COVID-19) cases of over one thousand cases as of October 20, 2023. Kerala and Karnataka followed, with relatively lower casualties. That day, there were a total of over 44 million confirmed infections across India.

The outbreak of the novel coronavirus in Wuhan, China, saw infection cases spread throughout the Asia-Pacific region. By April 13, 2024, India had faced over 45 million coronavirus cases. South Korea followed behind India as having had the second highest number of coronavirus cases in the Asia-Pacific region, with about 34.6 million cases. At the same time, Japan had almost 34 million cases. At the beginning of the outbreak, people in South Korea had been optimistic and predicted that the number of cases would start to stabilize. What is SARS CoV 2?Novel coronavirus, officially known as SARS CoV 2, is a disease which causes respiratory problems which can lead to difficulty breathing and pneumonia. The illness is similar to that of SARS which spread throughout China in 2003. After the outbreak of the coronavirus, various businesses and shops closed to prevent further spread of the disease. Impacts from flight cancellations and travel plans were felt across the Asia-Pacific region. Many people expressed feelings of anxiety as to how the virus would progress. Impact throughout Asia-PacificThe Coronavirus and its variants have affected the Asia-Pacific region in various ways. Out of all Asia-Pacific countries, India was highly affected by the pandemic and experienced more than 50 thousand deaths. However, the country also saw the highest number of recoveries within the APAC region, followed by South Korea and Japan.

Context

Coronaviruses are a large family of viruses which may cause illness in animals or humans. In humans, several coronaviruses are known to cause respiratory infections ranging from the common cold to more severe diseases such as Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) and Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS). The most recently discovered coronavirus causes coronavirus disease COVID-19 - World Health Organization

The number of new cases are increasing day by day around the world. This dataset has information from the states and union territories of India at daily level.

Data comes from Ministry of Health & Family Welfare

Content

COVID-19 cases at daily level is present in covid_19_india.csv file

Population at state level is present in population_india_census2011.csv file

Acknowledgements

Thanks to Indian Ministry of Health & Family Welfare for making the data available to general public.

Thanks to Wikipedia for population information.

Photo Courtesy - https://hgis.uw.edu/virus/

Inspiration

Looking for data based suggestions to stop / delay the spread of virus

As of May 2, 2023, the outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) had spread to almost every country in the world, and more than 6.86 million people had died after contracting the respiratory virus. Over 1.16 million of these deaths occurred in the United States.

Waves of infections Almost every country and territory worldwide have been affected by the COVID-19 disease. At the end of 2021 the virus was once again circulating at very high rates, even in countries with relatively high vaccination rates such as the United States and Germany. As rates of new infections increased, some countries in Europe, like Germany and Austria, tightened restrictions once again, specifically targeting those who were not yet vaccinated. However, by spring 2022, rates of new infections had decreased in many countries and restrictions were once again lifted.

What are the symptoms of the virus? It can take up to 14 days for symptoms of the illness to start being noticed. The most commonly reported symptoms are a fever and a dry cough, leading to shortness of breath. The early symptoms are similar to other common viruses such as the common cold and flu. These illnesses spread more during cold months, but there is no conclusive evidence to suggest that temperature impacts the spread of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. Medical advice should be sought if you are experiencing any of these symptoms.

Executive summary: Studying the spread and epidemiological characteristics of COVID-19 virus specially in household settings are needed to prepare our self-better in preventing and controlling this epidemic. In this study we proposed a conceptual framework of four level of determinates and tried to understand the transmission dynamics of COVID-19 among household contacts along with clinical, epidemiological and virologic characteristics of the infection.

Aims & Objectives:

1. the proportion of asymptomatic cases and symptomatic cases;
2. the incubation period of COVID-19 and the duration of infectiousness and of detectable shedding;
3. the serial interval of COVID-19 infection;
4. clinical risk factors for COVID-19, and the clinical course and severity of disease;
5. high-risk population subgroups;
6. the secondary infection rate and secondary clinical attack rate of COVID-19 infection among household contacts; and
7. the associations of various factors across four dimensions interaction associated with risk of transmission

Methodology: This was a case-ascertained study where all susceptible contacts of a laboratory confirmed COVID-19 case were studied prospective for four weeks after their enrolment. It was done in New Delhi, during the end of first wave as well as whole second wave from December 2020 to July 2021. The study team collected the key information by questionnaire along with blood and oro-nasal swab during the household visits. Follow-up was done on day 7, 14 and 28 for observing the disease characteristic and symptomatology along with confirmation by serum and oro-nasal swab testing. Daily characteristics of the infection were noted by the participants on symptoms diary.

Results: We enrolled 99 households, each having one laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 index case along with their 318 susceptible contacts. By the end of the follow-up, secondary infection rate was seen at 55.5%, while seroconversion in 46.6%. Hospitalization and case fatality rate was 3.83% and 1.7% respectively. Among epidemiological characteristics we observed serial interval of 8.0 ± 6.7 days, generation time 3.8 ± 6.4, while secondary attack rate was 54.9%. The predictors of secondary infection among individual contact level were being female (OR:2.13, 95% CI:1.27 - 3.57), age of the household contact (1.01;1.00 - 1.03), symptoms at baseline (3.39; 1.61- 7.12) and during follow-up (3.18; 1.64 - 6.19), while only symptoms during follow-up (3.81: 1.43 - 10.14) and being RT-PCR positive (8.32; 3.22 -21.54) was significantly and independently associated with seroconversion among household contacts. Among index case-level age of the primary case (1.03; 1.01 -1.04) and any symptoms during follow-up (6.29; 1.83-21.63) significantly and independently associated with secondary infection while any symptoms during follow-up was associated with seroconversion among household contacts. Among household-level characteristics having more rooms (4.44; 2.16 - 9.13) independently associated with secondary infection, while more rooms (3.98; 1.23 -12.90) along with overcrowding (0.37; 0.16 - 0.82) associated with seroconversion. Among contact pattern only taking care of the index case (2.02;1.21- 3.38) was significantly and independently associated with secondary infection, while none was associated with seroconversion.

Conclusion: A high secondary cases and secondary attack rate was seen in our study. This highlights the need to adopts strict measure and advocate COVID appropriate behaviours in order to break the transmission chain at household level. The targeted approach at household contacts with higher risk would be efficient in limiting the development of infection among susceptible contacts.

As of May 2, 2023, there were roughly 687 million global cases of COVID-19. Around 660 million people had recovered from the disease, while there had been almost 6.87 million deaths. The United States, India, and Brazil have been among the countries hardest hit by the pandemic.

The various types of human coronavirus The SARS-CoV-2 virus is the seventh known coronavirus to infect humans. Its emergence makes it the third in recent years to cause widespread infectious disease following the viruses responsible for SARS and MERS. A continual problem is that viruses naturally mutate as they attempt to survive. Notable new variants of SARS-CoV-2 were first identified in the UK, South Africa, and Brazil. Variants are of particular interest because they are associated with increased transmission.

Vaccination campaigns Common human coronaviruses typically cause mild symptoms such as a cough or a cold, but the novel coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 has led to more severe respiratory illnesses and deaths worldwide. Several COVID-19 vaccines have now been approved and are being used around the world.

India tested over 935 million samples for the coronavirus (COVID-19) as of October 20, 2023. The number of people infected with the virus was coming down across the south Asian country. The country was hit with a second wave in March 2021, leading to a collapse of the healthcare system.

The Third Plague Epidemic began in the mid-1800s in Yunnan, China, (an area that is still a natural reservoir for the Yersinia pestis bacteria) and had a huge death toll across Asia in the next century. While plague was confined to the Yunnan region for some decades, the mass displacement and social upheaval caused by the Taiping Rebellion saw millions flee the area , bringing the disease to other parts of the country. A plague epidemic then emerged in British-controlled Hong Kong in 1894, where merchants then unknowingly transported infected rats to other parts of the empire along various trade routes. Arrival in Bombay The first Indian cases were reported in Bombay (present-day Mumbai), and the Bombay Presidency suffered more losses than any other region in India (although there were some individual years where the state of Punjab reported more deaths). As with most disease or famine outbreaks in the region, the British authorities were slow to react, and their eventual response was in many ways too late. In some cases authorities even facilitated the spread of the disease; with multiple accounts of the military forcing healthy people into quarantine camps, evicting and burning homes of the afflicted, or by using such excessive force that the public would refuse medical help. Spread in India Lack of understanding among the Indian public was also to their own detriment. Some religions in India forbid the killing of rats, while some people simply refused to acknowledge that they were sick. As the plague in Bombay spiraled out of control, many fled to other parts of the country, taking the plague with them. It is estimated that there were over one million deaths in India by 1902, and almost one million further deaths in 1903 alone. The first four months of 1904 also saw over half a million deaths, almost matching the entire total for 1902. Plague would remain endemic to India for the next few decades, and there are varying reports of up to 10 or 12 million total plague deaths in this time. The public health measures taken to combat the plague in the early 20th century would mark the beginnings of India's public health system, and some of the quarantine measures put in place by the colonial government were even used in 2020 during the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic.

With the third-highest number of confirmed COVID-19 cases worldwide, Brazil was the country that required the largest volume of oxygen in Latin America. As of August 13, 2021, the Portuguese-speaking nation needed nearly 1.5 million cubic meters of oxygen per day to treat its patients. Meanwhile, Mexico needed close to 742 thousand cubic meters of oxygen per day. Most of the countries in the region required less than 200 thousand cubic meters of oxygen per day. A critical situation Medical oxygen is pivotal for treating patients affected by the COVID-19 disease. The virus can cause pneumonia, which can lead to acute respiratory distress syndrome (lung failure) and eventually death. Medical oxygen enables patients to receive the oxygen required for normal bodily function. With more than 206 million cases worldwide, oxygen demand is at an all-time high. As of May 3, 2021, India required the most oxygen at more than 2 million cylinders per day. It is not just oxygen The shortfall in the amount of medical oxygen in Brazil is coupled with a general lack of resources. In 2019, the South American country had only 1.05 intensive care unit (ICU) beds per 100,000 population. In addition, Brazil registered just over 25 ventilators per 100,000 inhabitants that same year. Unfortunately, as one of the most affected countries worldwide, this is not enough to meet the soaring demand.