Union Health Minister Dr Harsh Vardhan, while while interacting with autonomous Institute of Department of Biotechnology, through video conferencing on Tuesday said that no fresh case of COVID-19 coronavirus has been reported in 80 districts in the last seven days.

Elaborating on the present situation, the minister said that in 47 districts, no case has been reported in the last 14 days, while 39 districts have not reported a case in 21 days. He further added that 17 districts have not reported a case for last 28 days.

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According to the Health Minister pre-lockdown the doubling rate of the cases in India was around 3 days but for the last 14 days it had been 8.2 and for the last 7 days it was 10.2. In the last 3 days it is 10.9. “This is a very significant progress,” he said.

“129 districts where there are a significant number of cases, around 15 or less, we call them hotspots. These are the places where we are focusing our approach on cluster containment and disease outbreak containment strategies. There is house to house survey in five kilometers area. Right now in the last 24 hours there are 16 states which have not reported any new case,” the Union minister added.

Harsh Vardhan further stated that the Coronavirus pandemic has come in India as a “blessing in disguise” as it has given impetus to various activities under the Make in India project.

“This pandemic has come as a blessing in disguise for India as lots of activities have also started in make in India. We are now manufacturing PPEs and have over hundred manufacturers in the country. We are making 1 lakh to 1.5 lakh PPEs everyday in the country”.

He also said that the whole country has been waiting very anxiously for the contribution of the Indian scientists whether it is about discovery of new drug or successful trial of drugs which are used at present, or discovery of a vaccine or indigenous testing kits.

Lauding the efforts of the Department of Biotechnology, Harsh Vardhan said that it is supporting a number of companies in research and vaccine development for COVID-19 infection.

“We have made quite a progress in that direction,” said he, adding, “Genome sequencing activities have started on thousand viruses in biotechnology. Indigenous antibody test kits and RT-PCR kits are doing an exemplary job and ICMR ramped up their testing capacity. Right now we have our indigenous kits.”

The Health Minister stressed, “We all have to see that we deliver results which could be converted into useful implementable solution for the people of India.”

His comments come as India has decided to stop using rapid antibody test kits procured from two Chinese firms, Guangzhou Wondfo Biotech and Zhuhai Livzon Diagnostics after their results showed wide variations.

Also, all orders of the testing kits for Coronavirus made to these Chinese firms have been cancelled.

The number of infections due to the COVID-19 pandemic in India soared to 29,435 including the 6,868 people who have been treated and discharged so far. The death toll reached 934 on Tuesday, with as many as 62 deaths and 1,543 cases being reported in the last 24 hours.