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As coronavirus cases in the national capital show an upward trend, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Thursday, 23 December, said that the state government has built a capacity to handle as many as 1 lakh cases daily.
At the peak of the second wave that plagued the country in April-June this year, Delhi had reported as many as 28,000 cases in a single day.
Addressing a press conference amid concerns about the spread of the Omicron variant of COVID-19, of which Delhi has reported 64 cases so far, Arvind Kejriwal said:
"Omicron has two characteristics. One, that it spreads at great speed. Two, it appears to be quite mild. It leads to fewer hospitalisations, deaths."
"We appeal to persons with mild symptoms to stay at home, don't rush to hospital. Under our home isolation module, our healthcare workers will visit patients at their residence, conduct tele-counselling and also give a kit containing oximeter, medicines etc to them," he said.
Kejriwal indicated that the city was increasing its medical manpower to meet with the expectation of a high number of cases of the highly-transmissible variant. He noted that the government was also stocking medicines for the coming two months.
The chief minister had held a high-level review meeting earlier on Thursday, a day after Delhi reported 125 COVID-19 cases – the highest in six months.
As much as 99 percent of the city's population has received the first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, while over 70 percent have received the second dose, Kejriwal indicated on Thursday.
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