The Indian Journal of Medical Research (IJMR) carried out sentinel surveillance among severe acute respiratory illness (SARI) patients to help identify the spread and extent of transmission of novel coronavirus or COVID-19.
Methods: SARI patients admitted at 41 sentinel sites from February 15 onwards were tested for COVID-19 by real-time reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction, targeting the SARS-CoV-2 E (envelope protein) and RdRp (RNA-dependent RNA polymerase) genes9. Data were extracted from Virus Research and Diagnostic Laboratory Network for analysis.
Report analysis: In India, total of 5,911 SARI patients were tested for COVID-19, Of these, 104 (1.8 percent) tested positive for COVID-19. Among those 965 SARI patient samples, which were tested between February 15 and March 19 (the first three weeks), there was only two positive cases. However, in the next two week, i.e. from March 22 to April 22, there were 102 new positive cases.
Gender-wise break-up: Of the 5,723 SARI patients that were tested, there were 3,676 male and 2,047 women. The number of postive COVID-19 cases among males and females were 85 and 17, respectively.
Age-wise break up: When the data was drill down further on the basis of age, the maximum number of infected people were found in the age group of 50-59. Of the 637 cases tested, 31 tests returned positive for COVID-19. The second impact age group was 60-69 bracket. There was no single positive case found in the 10-19 age group on testing 371 people.
States-wise break up: COVID-19 cases among SARI patients were detected from 52 districts in 20 states. Majority of SARI patients were tested from Gujarat (792). However, Tamil Nadu and Maharashtra had the highest number of COVID-19 positive case at 14 each.
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