Will the second wave taper off by July end? | Economic Times

The second wave of Covid-19 in the country is likely to taper off by July end, scientists working on mathematical models to predict the coronavirus trajectory in India have said. India is expected to report about 20,000 daily cases or even less by July, said scientists associated with two mathematical models — SUTRA developed by IIT Kanpur, IIT Hyderabad and Integrated Defence Staff and COV-IND-19 Study group at University of Michigan. Both had rightly predicted India’s Covid-19 cases would peak in mid-May.With cases declining over the last one week, scientists said the peak has passed but warned that the difficult time for India would continue till mid-June. “As far as the total case numbers are concerned, the peak of infections has passed,” Bhramar Mukherjee, who leads COV-Ind-19 Study Group at University of Michigan, told ET. “But the concept of a national peak is nebulous. It is driven by a few states and urban metros, for example, Delhi, Maharashtra, and Karnataka. Once cases start declining in these states, the overall national numbers start slowing,” she said. “But the difficult time is far from over; let us not get a false sense of security,” Mukherjee said. “Many states are experiencing their peak right now. Healthcare system is still overwhelmed with 250,000 daily cases and over 4,000 deaths.”SUTRA also predicts the second wave to ebb by July. “The way the cases have been declining over the last seven days, we can say the national peak is over. But it would not be right to say that the difficult phase for our country is over,” Manindra Agrawal of IIT Kanpur said. “Case count is still very high in Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Kerala and Andhra Pradesh. Our model predicts that the cases would decline further by mid-June”The scientists, however, said deaths would decline at a slower rate. “Our model had predicted that deaths would peak later than cases and decline at a slower rate through this month,” Mukherjee said.