While Kerala remains the state with the highest number of active Covid-19 cases in India, the state’s death tally is set to go up by 7000 due to ‘correction’ of under-reporting done earlier. The Communist government in the state has decided to add 7,000 death to the state’s Covid-19 death tally after allegations of under-reporting of deaths emerged.
Following the revision, the total Covid-19 death tally of Kerala will go up to over 33,000 from the current death toll of over 26,000. Announcing the decision to add more deaths in the state assembly on Friday, Kerala health minister Veena George said that these deaths were not included in official data for Covid-19 deaths due to the absence of relevant records. “If complaints exist about omissions in the list, the Health Department is open to look into them,” the minister added.
Reportedly, 7000 additional deaths will be added to the death toll till the second week of June. Till that time, a state medical board used to review deaths and announce the final list. This practice was criticised by health experts and opposition parties because the board allegedly didn’t include a large number where the patients had tested negative for Covid-19 after being infected, but died later due to complications caused by the Chinese virus infection.
From June second week, the practice of review of deaths by the board was stopped, and the hospitals started directly uploading death numbers.
While the state govt has admitted that the state’s Covid-19 deaths were being under-reported, health minister Veena George denied the opposition’s allegation that it was deliberate. “There was no deliberate attempt to exclude deaths of so many from the tally. We have been following ICMR guideline regarding Covid-19 deaths, but due to some technical glitches these deaths were left out. We will revise the list again,” the minister said in the assembly on Friday.
