The highest in 129 days, a total of 8,807 fresh Covid-19 cases were added to Maharashtra’s daily tally on Wednesday. The state reported 80 deaths, highest in two months since December 24, when 89 deaths were reported.

With this, the total cases in the state jumped to 21,21,119 and the toll touched 51,937

Mumbai also saw a three-month high in daily Covid-19 cases. It reported 1,167 new infections, the highest in 119 days. The last time the city had more than 1,167 cases was on October 28, when 1,354 were detected and Mumbai was merely coming out of the peak. It is also after 88 days since November 28 (1,063) that the city has added over 1,000 cases in a day.

There was a detailed presentation in the state cabinet meeting where data on the Covid-19 surge and the ongoing vaccination drive was presented. Nawab Malik, minister for skill development, said Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray instructed all districts to increase testing and contact tracing.

Intensivist Dr Rahul Pandit, a member of the state Covid task force, was quoted as saying by TOI that the rise in cases was “concerning”. “A rise in critical cases or deaths is seen 7-14 days after a surge in cases,” he said, adding that the next 10 days would be make or break for

Mumbai.

The health department said in the meeting that despite a rise in average cases in February, the case fatality rate (CFR) is low. The daily average of cases in January was 2,973 and the case fatality rate was 1.7%. The daily average cases are 3,347 and total deaths reported in February are 775, taking the CFR to 0.4%.

Mumbai circle on Wednesday reported 2,018 cases, highest in the state, followed by Pune circle with 1,811 cases. Akola and Nagpur circles from Vidarbha region that is currently the eye of the storm saw 1,679 and 1,323 cases, respectively.

After a gap of more than a month, Mumbai’s slum colony of Dharavi also reported a double-digit count of COVID-19 cases at 10 on Wednesday, the city civic body said. A senior Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) official said the slum-dominated area, spread over 2.5 sq km, recorded 10 new cases in the last 24 hours, taking the tally to 4,041.

Two variants of the novel coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) have been detected in at least three states in India, the Union Health Ministry said on Tuesday, adding that there was no evidence to show that they were responsible for the fresh wave of infections.

“There are two variants in Maharashtra being talked about – N440K variant and E484K variant. Yes, these variants are there in Maharashtra, Kerala and Telangana,” said Dr VK Paul, Member (Health), NITI Aayog.