How would COVID bahave in August - few projections

Entering August with COVID by side 

Entering in the month of August, COVID is still here by our side. Situation seems grim, worse than earlier, as number of active cases as well as the count of deceased patients are increasing day by day. Yesterday we crossed the mark of 50,000 cases in a day. Closely competing with Brazil with US counts also in range now.

On the other side, few other numbers like reduced mortality rate to 2.18%, recovery rate of 64.6% and slightly increased doubling rate of 21 days can reduce the anxiety.

My projections of 16.75 lakhs for India might be crossed by coupe of thousands of more cases after today’s count is added. This number would reach to a huge count of 28.5 lakhs by August 15.

Maharashtra just doesn’t like competition. Just like what Delhi tried few days back, Andhra Pradesh also managed to cross Maharashtra’s per day count for2 consecutive days. Seems like not a good idea. Maharashtra immediately went to the next zone. The state which was lingering around 9000 cases suddenly shot up to 11.5 K cases yesterday. Just like Delhi, if AP also gives up and starts recovering, there is no better news than that. I see Maharashtra crossing 5.25 L mark by Mid-August. While Andhra Pradesh may touch a number of somewhere around 3.8 Lakhs. This number for AP seems little unimaginable, but is a projection based on current rising trend. It may happen that the rising pattern may not continue and would restrict the rise upto 3 L count.

Tamilnadu is keeping a steady state rate and reach its decided mark of  2.4 L with one day left. It would further grow upto 3.5 L in coming 15 days.

For Karnataka, looks like the trend would continue for some days and may increase upto 2.5- 2.6 lakh cases by mid-August.

UP also is following the predicted trend and would reach its number of ~ 85K today. In coming 15 days, we may see the number rising upto 1.85 lakhs.

Telangana seems to have got the spread under control. The number has drastically reduced the number  to ~ 60000 compared what I projected for the state. We won’t see it crossing 1 lakhs count by mid of the month. (98000).

Delhi and Gujrat are recovering states now. Delhi’s count is exceptionally lower than the projected count. It is low to the extent that I project the same number of 1.65 lakhs again till the mid of the August.

Gujrat is following the projections. Would reach around 62000 by today and may go on to 85000 by 15 August.

So, some good stories, some worrisome ones. One aspect is the rising number of cases is making the pandemic look weaker as mortality effect is getting lower with it. Few other stories that are making rounds is about the cases where people even didn’t know they probably had COVID. A recent SERO survey in some regions of Mumbai showed that as many as 57%  people (who did not report for COVID) tested in the survey already have antigens present. I see people in Mumbai loosing interest in taking precautions now. Contrary to few days back, now more and more people without masks are seen moving around. That makes me thinking, should we and how long should we keep worrying about this pandemic?

COVID-19 July End: Where would India stand?

This last week seems terrible. The kind of spurt we saw in last many days was unexpected. Yesterday's count was 45000+. I did not expect. Are coming days going to report bigger numbers than this? We need to understand the cycle it follows. Mumbai is a good example. Since beginning Mumbai was heading the race. While other cities were reporting the count in 10's or 100's, Mumbai was reporting in thousands. back then, as much as 60-70% of Mahrashtra's total count was coming from Mumbai. Now after a period of almost 3 months, Mumbai is lagging behind. Pune, Kalyan, Thane have overtaken Mumbai. The famous hotspots of Dharavi, Dadar, Sion, Worli are longer uttered in the news. Of course, the counts are still there, but they do not attract any more attention. This is a cycle which will be followed in every new red zone area. The point is how big spike we allow the zone to get and how quickly we nab it.

Delhi at one point started competing with Mumbai/Maharashtra. But, it has fallen in line pretty quickly and actually is on the way to good recovery. Now the new competitors have come up in the form of Bangalore/Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh. They are really emerging as big threat to the invincible position of Maharashtra. All the cycle will complete and we will get all the place back to normal, but the question is when?

The we see big spikes every other day, we see the recovery rate improving and mortality rate decreasing every day. As of now more than 63% people have recovered and the mortality rate has come down to 2.4% from 3.2%.

My projection for India till 22nd July was 12.3 Lakh. This would have gone fine had we not seen the sudden surge of 45000 cases yesterday. With this the dynamics change a bit and we could see a big rise to 16.75 lakhs by the end of this month.

Last week, my overestimated Maharashtra's number of COVID-19 cases. Probably, Maharashtra did not like it and so, this time took care that my projection seems underestimated. My projection was crossed on the last day. I believe, the number for cases in Maharashtra is going to rise significantly and we can see a number of 4.2 lakhs crossed by the end of the month.

Tamilnadu projections were in line. It stands at 1.86 lakhs cases today. There is a kind of change in the trend. We can say now there is a kind of linear variation in the number of cases reported, although the slope is pretty steep. Tamilnadu seems to have lost its curve. I see the number rising upto 2.3-2.4 lakh cases by the month end.

Gujrat and Delhi are two states which was moved away from the limelight of COVID news. Both are doing pretty well. While Delhi is showing signs of recovery, the rate of growth in Gujrat is minimized, though in recovery mode yet. If all things go well for Delhi, we won't see much increase in coming days, but if things twist a bit, the number may reach up to 1.65 lakhs. The numbers for Gujrat also doesn't show much increase. It may rest some where around 62,000 .

Uttar Pradesh reached  pretty close to my projection of 57K. There is still an increasing trend here with the projections showing upto 85000 cases by month end.

Karnataka, as expected is showing newer and newer spikes every day. It crossed my projection by a big margin. But it seems, now it is settled in a new zone and may stay here for some time. By the end of the month, we may see around 1.25 lakh cases reported for the state.

The big surprise of the month is Andhra Pradesh. The cases are rising like anything here. I guess, after  Maharashtra, AP is the only state to report more than 6000 cases in a day. It crossed my earlier projections of 50000 and unlike Karnataka, it is not yet settled in a new zone. The picture could be scary in coming days and we may see a steep rise to 1.3 lakhs by the end of the month.

For Telangana, the projections as of now are pretty spot on. It very close to the projected mark of 50000. We could see the number rising steadily to 75,000 cases by July end.

The sudden spikes we are seeing is actually not a worrisome situation. The number is rising because the number of testing are increasing. While it may indicate that the controlling COVID spread is not much in our hand now, but recovering out of it is largely possible.

Let pray for the best.

July end COVID19 projections

This last week seems terrible. The kind of spurt we saw in last many days was unexpected. Yesterday's count was 45000+. I did not expect. Are coming days going to report bigger numbers than this? We need to understand the cycle it follows. Mumbai is a good example. Since beginning Mumbai was heading the race. While other cities were reporting the count in 10's or 100's, Mumbai was reporting in thousands. back then, as much as 60-70% of Mahrashtra's total count was coming from Mumbai. Now after a period of almost 3 months, Mumbai is lagging behind. Pune, Kalyan, Thane have overtaken Mumbai. The famous hotspots of Dharavi, Dadar, Sion, Worli are longer uttered in the news. Of course, the counts are still there, but they do not attract any more attention. This is a cycle which will be followed in every new red zone area. The point is how big spike we allow the zone to get and how quickly we nab it.

Delhi at one point started competing with Mumbai/Maharashtra. But, it has fallen in line pretty quickly and actually is on the way to good recovery. Now the new competitors have come up in the form of Bangalore/Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh. They are really emerging as big threat to the invincible position of Maharashtra. All the cycle will complete and we will get all the place back to normal, but the question is when?

The we see big spikes every other day, we see the recovery rate improving and mortality rate decreasing every day. As of now more than 63% people have recovered and the mortality rate has come down to 2.4% from 3.2%.

My projection for India till 22nd July was 12.3 Lakh. This would have gone fine had we not seen the sudden surge of 45000 cases yesterday. With this the dynamics change a bit and we could see a big rise to 16.75 lakhs by the end of this month.

Last week, my overestimated Maharashtra's number of COVID-19 cases. Probably, Maharashtra did not like it and so, this time took care that my projection seems underestimated. My projection was crossed on the last day. I believe, the number for cases in Maharashtra is going to rise significantly and we can see a number of 4.2 lakhs crossed by the end of the month.

Tamilnadu projections were in line. It stands at 1.86 lakhs cases today. There is a kind of change in the trend. We can say now there is a kind of linear variation in the number of cases reported, although the slope is pretty steep. Tamilnadu seems to have lost its curve. I see the number rising upto 2.3-2.4 lakh cases by the month end.

Gujrat and Delhi are two states which was moved away from the limelight of COVID news. Both are doing pretty well. While Delhi is showing signs of recovery, the rate of growth in Gujrat is minimized, though in recovery mode yet. If all things go well for Delhi, we won't see much increase in coming days, but if things twist a bit, the number may reach up to 1.65 lakhs. The numbers for Gujrat also doesn't show much increase. It may rest some where around 62,000 .

Uttar Pradesh reached  pretty close to my projection of 57K. There is still an increasing trend here with the projections showing upto 85000 cases by month end.

Karnataka, as expected is showing newer and newer spikes every day. It crossed my projection by a big margin. But it seems, now it is settled in a new zone and may stay here for some time. By the end of the month, we may see around 1.25 lakh cases reported for the state.

The big surprise of the month is Andhra Pradesh. The cases are rising like anything here. I guess, after  Maharashtra, AP is the only state to report more than 6000 cases in a day. It crossed my earlier projections of 50000 and unlike Karnataka, it is not yet settled in a new zone. The picture could be scary in coming days and we may see a steep rise to 1.3 lakhs by the end of the month.

For Telangana, the projections as of now are pretty spot on. It very close to the projected mark of 50000. We could see the number rising steadily to 75,000 cases by July end.

The sudden spikes we are seeing is actually not a worrisome situation. The number is rising because the number of testing are increasing. While it may indicate that the controlling COVID spread is not much in our hand now, but recovering out of it is largely possible.

Let pray for the best.

COVID-19: One Week long projection post mid july

How would you call the COVID-19 situation in India for the last week. In contrast to what I hear around, I would say, the situation in India is improving.

Lets see the reasons why I feel so:

- Recovery rate has gone up to 63%. So, there is almost 2/3rd chance of survival for every person getting infected by COVID

- The mortality rate has now reduced down to ~2.5%, way down from 3.2% in a 10 days duration.This is happening because of more and more testing. Today's report said, we did record 3.2 lakh testing in a day. This implies that the possibility of death because of COVID-19 is getting low. It may mean,  most of the people around can do fine with a little low panic level. Of course, precautions are necessary, if you don't want to fall in that very low 2.5% mortality set.

Coming down to numbers.

I am happy to see that India deviated significantly from my mid-July projection of 10.25 lakhs. Good to see the lowered down number. This shows the kind of control we are getting on the COVID spread. In my June end post I projected 11.5 lakhs, which I corrected to 10.25 lakhs last week. But in reality, today its standing at 9.75 lakhs. Some one may call it wrong projections, but I would call it corrections, because of the day to day actions taken by the government and other contributing people in the fight. You might be seeing big spikes in recent times. If those numbers are worrying you, the expected spikes were much bigger than the current ones and its all the credit to the steps taken to curb the spread. Going with the current scenario, I see the number reaching a mark of 12- 12.3 lakhs by 22nd July. I would be surprised if the number crosses this mark before that time.

The major contributor, Maharashtra is showing some big spikes reaching upto 8k per day. In spite, its number fell short of my projections of 3.25 for mid July. One of the reasons behind this lag is the control over the spread within Mumbai. At one point Mumbai was reporting 2000+ cases per day, which has now reduced down to less than 1000 cases per day. Means Mumbai has  probably crossed the peak. The big number which we are seeing is because of the rest of Maharashtra. Places like Thane, Pune, Aurangabad  are moving towards their peak and reporting higher and higher number every day. This shall too pass very soon. In coming week, I see the number touching 3.3 lakh cases by July 22. Going by this, we have gained 1 weeks time to reach that mark.

Tamilnadu also has shown some improvements. As a result, the number was restricted to 1.52 lakhs instead of projected 1.75 lakhs. In coming week, the number may reach 1.8 - 1.9 lakh case. 

Delhi has given a big surprise. Last week, I revised the projections for Delhi from 1.75 lakhs to 1.25 lakhs. And today we see, the number is even lower than the revised projection. Last week I also said that Delhi is on way to recovery and that looks actually happening. There are no surprising spikes and even per day rise rate is also decreasing. If it continues, we can see the number restricted to 135000 by 22nd July.

One state that has come up in the picture is Karnataka. This week, it replaced Gujrat from the 4th position. I did a projection of 47000 cases by mid-July, with a worse case scenario of 65000 cases. Luckily, my normal scenario prevailed and we see today's Karnataka number of 47253 cases. Although, now, am projecting a rise upto 68000 by July 22 for Karnataka, the number may show some variations, considering the Karnataka government is taking some very strict steps to get a control on the COVID rise. Lets hope for the best.

There are couple of other states which are showing some significant rise in last few days. But, I do not think, any of these states would try to take up the place of Mahrashtra or Tamilnadu. I am listing down projections for some of these states down here:

State                                22nd July Projections
----------------------------------------------------------
UP                                        57000
TEL                                      50000
AP                                        50000

I wish my projections go wrong and all of them fall short of the target.

COVID-19 -Mid July Projections

Half of the year is gone. Come July and what is happening at the COVID-19 front now for India.

With the number of cases pretty fast, all seems getting more and more worried. But I will start on good note.

Lets talk about the doubling rate.  The doubling rate of cases has increase from last time 17 days to 20 days now. Some reports suggested that the doubling rate of 30+ days means things are well in control.

Now, a more important factor - mortality rate. We are doing even better here. The mortality rate has reduced from 3.2% to 2.8%. This is good news.

Third thing is the recovery rate. India's recovery rate has increased to 60%

Coming to Country and state wise projections.

India has found a lot new contributors to increase its counts. Of course Maharashtra is in no mood to give away its premium position. Still, I would say, India is in a better situation then what I projected at the end of the month of June. I am revising my projections for the total number of cases for India down to 10.25 lakhs from the earlier projection of 11.5 lakhs.

 

When it comes to State wise contributions, there is no competition to Maharashtra. It has single handedly contributed more than 2 lakh cases by now. With per day cases rising to whopping 7,000 cases, there is no one to challenge Maharashtra. In between, Delhi did attempted it for a day or two. But it learnt its lesson pretty quickly and has now fallen in line towards recovery. By 15th July, Maharashtra may touch a number around 3.2 lakhs. If it shows recovery sign, it may reduce the number to 3 lakhs. In any case this is a far better situation than my earlier projection of 3.75 lakhs. Means, some measures have been taken and probably they are showing their results.

The nearest competitor is Tamilnadu. It has neither improved nor worsened its situation. The projection for Tamilnadu stays at 1.75 lakhs as projected earlier.

After learning a lesson, when it attempted to surpass Maharashtra's per day count  for a day or two, Delhi has not only controlled but also has started showing signs of recovery. Last few days improvements if considered, Delhi would be found around 1.25 lakh cases compared to earlier projection of 1.75 lakhs. Even in little worse situation, I don't see the number going beyond 1.5 lakhs.

 

If there is one state which has shown a dramatic shift, its Gujrat. Till May 13, it was the leading state after Maharashtra, while Tamilnadu and Delhi were trying to catch up with it. But since then, it started loosing its position and is now settled at 4th position. The count is also pretty low compared to other 3 states. I don't see the number going beyond 45,000 by 15th July. It may too happen that it will loose it 4th position also by then.

 

So, which state may takes its position? The surprising name is Karnataka. While we were listening to the Bangalore model of controlling COVID-19, suddenly we are seeing bigger and bigger spikes for the states. Now, am seeing two scenarios here. If the current trend of lets say per day almost 2000 cases keep continuing, then the count may go up to 47,000 cases. But, if the gradient of increasing cases day seems increasing, then an increase upto 65,000 is also on the cards. So, we are looking at a new beast emerging on the platform. Better control it in time.

 

One of the other states gaining interest in Uttar Pradesh. Although the number seems increasing, the projections seem to reach up to 38000 cases, which is still a number under control.

 

With the current numbers, we have crossed Russia and are at the 3rd position, behind USA and Brazil. Looks like we will be here for some time. No competition to topple us down as yet. Will update the status as always by next Monday. But, am sure, the situation will improve further in coming time. Till then,

STAY HOME, STAY SAFE.



 

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For earlier projections:

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https://drkaustubhjoshi.blogspot.com/

 

COVID-19 mid July projection

Half of the year is gone. Come July and what is happening at the COVID-19 front now for India.

With the number of cases pretty fast, all seems getting more and more worried. But I will start on good note.

Lets talk about the doubling rate.  The doubling rate of cases has increase from last time 17 days to 20 days now. Some reports suggested that the doubling rate of 30+ days means things are well in control.

Now, a more important factor - mortality rate. We are doing even better here. The mortality rate has reduced from 3.2% to 2.8%. This is good news.

Third thing is the recovery rate. India's recovery rate has increased to 60%

Coming to Country and state wise projections.

India has found a lot new contributors to increase its counts. Of course Maharashtra is in no mood to give away its premium position. Still, I would say, India is in a better situation then what I projected at the end of the month of June. I am revising my projections for the total number of cases for India down to 10.25 lakhs from the earlier projection of 11.5 lakhs.

 

When it comes to State wise contributions, there is no competition to Maharashtra. It has single handedly contributed more than 2 lakh cases by now. With per day cases rising to whopping 7,000 cases, there is no one to challenge Maharashtra. In between, Delhi did attempted it for a day or two. But it learnt its lesson pretty quickly and has now fallen in line towards recovery. By 15th July, Maharashtra may touch a number around 3.2 lakhs. If it shows recovery sign, it may reduce the number to 3 lakhs. In any case this is a far better situation than my earlier projection of 3.75 lakhs. Means, some measures have been taken and probably they are showing their results.

The nearest competitor is Tamilnadu. It has neither improved nor worsened its situation. The projection for Tamilnadu stays at 1.75 lakhs as projected earlier.

After learning a lesson, when it attempted to surpass Maharashtra's per day count  for a day or two, Delhi has not only controlled but also has started showing signs of recovery. Last few days improvements if considered, Delhi would be found around 1.25 lakh cases compared to earlier projection of 1.75 lakhs. Even in little worse situation, I don't see the number going beyond 1.5 lakhs.

 

If there is one state which has shown a dramatic shift, its Gujrat. Till May 13, it was the leading state after Maharashtra, while Tamilnadu and Delhi were trying to catch up with it. But since then, it started loosing its position and is now settled at 4th position. The count is also pretty low compared to other 3 states. I don't see the number going beyond 45,000 by 15th July. It may too happen that it will loose it 4th position also by then.

 

So, which state may takes its position? The surprising name is Karnataka. While we were listening to the Bangalore model of controlling COVID-19, suddenly we are seeing bigger and bigger spikes for the states. Now, am seeing two scenarios here. If the current trend of lets say per day almost 2000 cases keep continuing, then the count may go up to 47,000 cases. But, if the gradient of increasing cases day seems increasing, then an increase upto 65,000 is also on the cards. So, we are looking at a new beast emerging on the platform. Better control it in time.

 

One of the other states gaining interest in Uttar Pradesh. Although the number seems increasing, the projections seem to reach upto 38000 cases, which is still a number under control.

 

With the current numbers, we have crossed Russia and are at the 3rd position, behind USA and Brazil. Looks like we will be here for some time. No competition to topple us down as yet. Will update the status as always by next Monday. But, am sure, the situation will improve further in coming time. Till then,

STAY HOME, STAY SAFE.



 

 

 

COVID-19 updates - June end

The past week seem to have changed the scenario little bit. A sudden jump in the reported positive cases is the reason behind it. Despite, I don't see much change in the projections. Last week, I revised the projection from 5.4 lakhs to 5.75 lakhs by the end of the month. The sudden spikes seen in the last few days would take this number to around 5.8 -5.9 lakhs. So, pretty much similar area of projection.
There are couple of good things to look forward too. Like, the recent doubling time was 17 days. Now we are in the 16th day since the count of 3.2 lakhs, and we have a pretty long way to reach the count of 6.4 lakhs. Means the doubling time would surely be more than 17 days. At the same time, the mortality rate has slightly reduced from 3.2% to 3.08%. Also, the recovery rate has also touched 60%.
Talking about further projections, by 15th July, we can see a huge jump reaching a count of 11.5 lakhs.

Talking about states, Maharashtra seems in no mood to loose its first position. In between for a day, it so happened that Delhi crossed over Maharashtra. With 3200 cases, Maharashtra stood at second position to Delhi with almost 3900 cases. This seems didn't go well with Maharashtra. Since then it changed its zone and directly jumped in a range of 5000+ cases. My projections of 1.7 to 1.9 lakhs seems to turn right. To be precise, it may touch and cross 1.75 lakh cases by the end of this month. Going further, the projections by 15 July could be reaching a whopping 3.75 lakh cases. At one point, Maharashtra was almost on the verge of flattening the plateau. But not any more. Once again, it is hitting 1/3rd of the cases of all the total count of India.
Tamilnadu, though little over estimating, seems to have come in control. The current numbers are crossing my projection and may settle around 90000 cases by the end of this month. But it still is far better than my 2 week back projection of 1.2 lakhs. By 15th July, I see the number growing to 1.75 lakhs though.
Delhi is a new favorite for discussion. It seem to follow the projected trend and may reach up to 92000 cases by the end of the month. But, it seems Delhi got little disheartened ( Good for Delhi) by Maharashtra which got into competitive mode suddenly. The rise in the number of cases seem to get settled between 3.5- 4 thousand cases. As a result, for Delhi too, the cases by the end of 15th July may reach a number of 1.75 lakhs.

All the other states are also reporting a bigger and bigger number of cases every day. But I am not currently going to project their numbers here, though I have projections done for many of them. May be I will put a table at the end of this month for couple of states for every ones reference.
I feel, the big spikes are seen for last few days, but there are pretty good number of good news also hidden within them. Lets be hopeful

Unlock 1.0 - third week

The situation looks little grim. Isn't it. Every day, we are hitting a new high. Last two days we crossed 15k mark of positive cases reported in a day. But there is a silver lining also to these updates. As many as 56% people have successfully recovered from COVID-19 and the number of active patients is reduced to 41%. At the same time, the mortality ratio has also not increased. Its kind of constant at 3.2%.

With sudden increase appearing in the number of cases, I had to revise the projections for the month end.

So, for India, the projection has gone up slightly. Compared to earlier 5.4 lakhs, now, it may touch a number somewhere around 5.75 lakhs.

My projection for Maharashtra last week seems overestimated. Although Maharashtra is reporting new highs every day, it  seems the total at the end of the month will stick around 1,70,000 to 1,90,000. That is a huge improvement.

I thought Tamilnadu is the next Maharashtra. But, seems it is proving me wrong. Contrary to earlier projection of 1,20,000, the new projection is limiting the number somewhere around 75-80 K. That is another improvement.

Only state, which seem to show worse upcoming situation than earlier projected is Delhi. The projections had to be revised from earlier number of 72,000 to 96,000. This seem to be competing with Maharashtra in per day new cases numbers reported.

Gujrat seem to be on track to good control. The projections seem moving in right direction from earlier 40,000 projected cases to 32-34 K cases by the end of the month.

 

All in all, except for Delhi, we are in good shape. If we check the actual active number of cases, we have hardly 1,76,000 cases to handle. Among these active cases, with current mortality rate, we amy have almost 5000 cases at risk of facing death situation. Can we save them?

The "10 second" rule of Plank

Picture taken from: https://www.spotebi.com/exercise-guide/up-down-plank/

So, are you trying to improve your stay in plank position for some time and you are still struggling?

I have a method that helped me to do it better.

A disclaimer here:  I am not saying that this is the technically perfect way of doing plank. But it should help you to stretch your stay in the position.

What is this "10 second rule" then?

To understand, lets go back a few days back. We all are stuck with the lockdown in  different phases in different areas. Before the lock down, I was preparing for a 10k marathon to be conducted in the month of May. I was practicing pretty fine. Basically, I was in a good shape.

But then lockdown happened.

I tried doing workout at home for few days. Later, the enthusiasm vanished and I ended up a lazy fellow. Add to that, few COVID patients were  found in the society. Even getting out of home to get milk or veggies, fruits became impossible.

Once the unlock 1.0 started, I first tried climbing up the stairs and realized, I am in a very bad shape.

So, back to workout. Designed few set of exercises for legs, upper body and core. Plank was ofcourse one of them.

7 days back I tried my first plank after a long interval. I couldn't believe, but, I failed to cross 30 sec. mark. Little unimaginable compared to my usual practice.

Second day, I unknowingly followed a method that helped me to touch 40 sec mark. So, I applied the next day again and it worked. Touched 50 sec. Next day, I could touch 60 sec mark. Four days of application led me to believe that I have a method that can help me to improve my stay in plank position. I call it a "10 sec rule"

"10 second rule"

 What unknowing thing I did on second day has nothing to do with the position in plank. I followed the regular way as shown above. The method deals with the controlled breathing. So, its a 10 second breathing pattern, I followed and it helped me.

As I start in plank position, I take a deep breathe over a period of first 3 seconds of the 10 second haul. I hold the breathe for next 4 seconds and later release it out in next 3 seconds. This makes one cycle. By the end of one cycle you complete 10 seconds. Holding the breathe kind of allows you to keep control on the core.

This way, if you want to touch 30 second mark, you have to complete only 3 cycles of controlled breathing. This makes life easier, as your task is now divided into three parts unlike earlier where you only concentrated on staying in right plank position for every passing second. With every new day arriving, your earlier cycle becomes easier and the last cycle is the one where you struggle, but with these 3 steps to follow, you some how manage to complete the cycle. The next day, even this last cycle become easier, allowing you to try one more cycle.

Starting with 40 seconds on 2nd day (first day of 10 second rule), in 7 days, today I have managed to touch to 100 seconds mark. Yes, I completed 10 cycles of controlled breathing. Today, I felt little challenging. I am not sure, if the method will help me to go beyond 100 second mark. I am going to try it anyway. But if it doesn't workout, I have another game plan to extend my stay in plank position.

As said earlier, I am not claiming that this is the right way to do plank. May be it is wrong. But it is helping me to improve my time. At the same, I feel my core little better than last week same day.

What do you think? You want to try out?

Let me know, if it helps you to increase your plank time. 

Unlock 1 continues

So, the Unlock 1.0 is slowly gripping up. Some people are questioning, with the increasing number of cases every day, is it the right way to go ahead or should there be another lock down imposed?

I believe, there is no more need of lock downs. What ever is to be achieved, has been achieved.

Inspite of what the number says, I would say, the spread is quite in control. If you remember, my projection of positive cases in India by 15th June, was 3,50,000. I made little revision last week and projected the number to be around 3.5 -3.8 lakh cases. Comparing the projection to actual numbers today, we are gladly way behind that number. By the end of the day, I don't see the number crossing 3,45,000 mark. This simply means, we are in a way improving the situation. Second aspect to check the rise, is to make a note of doubling time. The doubling time has increases to 17 days, which is a good news. 

This improvement is also reflected in the new projections, I am making till the end of June month. So, on 31st May, I projected the number for June end as 5,00,000. Then, I revised it to 6,00,000 by 8th June. Now, I am again revising it and putting it somewhere around 5.4 lakhs, which is a big improvement over the last week.

Now, Maharashtra has been a major contender behind these increasing number of cases. Last week, I projected the number of cases from Mahrashtra by the end of June 15 to increase to 1.1 -1.2 lakh cases. As of today, the number stands at 1.08 lakhs. By the end of the day, the number will rise probably to 1.11 lakhs. This is an improvement. Although, I also projected a case, where the number may have reached its peak at 1.2 lakhs and may start reducing. But looks like, that scenario will need some more time to come into picture. As per present situation, the projections for Maharashtra for the end of the month stands at around 2,35,000 cases. Maharashtra had started signs of recovery, but with the spread in areas in addition to Mumbai and Pune, looks like by June end, Maharashtra will be contributing almost 43% of total cases of India.

There is kind of competition between Tamilnadu and Delhi. I projected around 42,000 cases for both the state by 15th June. While Delhi is touching that mark today, Tamilnadu has gone past that number. I am little surprised, why then all the attention is on Delhi, while Tamilnadu situation is deteriorating day by day. If the current trend follows, Tamilnadu will cross a mark of 1.2 lakhs by the month end. There is a serious need to check the situation of Tamilnadu. In contrast, Delhi is given bigger attention. The situation is bad, but, I guess still far better than Tamilnadu. I do not see Delhi crossing 70,000 mark by the end of this month. That is a way better situation.

Gujrat is the fourth state in the race. But, it is lagging behind in the race, which is a good thing. I predicted two scenarios for the state. I am glad, the second scenario of projected 1,00,000 cases did not arise and Gujrat continued keeping strong grip on the spread of COVID. If the current trend continues, we can expected the number restricted to 40,000 cases.

So, these 4 states together will contribute almost 4,65,000 cases out of projected 5,40,000 cases across India. i.e. this ratio would decrease from 86% in two weeks to 65%. This is something to worry about. Other states would be contributing 35% of cases by the end of the month. If we manage to put control on rise in cases in other states, we would be able to significantly curb the spread of COVID. Let's see how things change in coming two weeks.

Unlock 1: First week

The first week of Unlocking the Indian Economy has started showing some signs of disturbance. But I guess these disturbances were expected and that's why I don't see any of the government showing any panic signs. On the contrary, they seem to go ahead with their plans to open up the economy further and further.

The last 3 days of the week have actually been exceptional. We have started recording the 3rd largest number of cases per day just after USA and Brazil. In fact, last 2 days, we have consecutively been crossing the mark of 10,000 cases per day. 

Unlike earlier, the contribution of Maharashtra towards total cases has reduced. Earlier, the share used to be between 35 -50 % of total cases, but now it has reduced to 25-33 % share. That doesn't mean Maharashtra has significantly improved its situation. It has just managed to maintain its COVID-19 cases to a constant number of 2500 -3000. In a way, it seems to have reach its peak interms of per day cases added. If the situation remains the same, by the end of 15 June, I project the number to stay around 1.1 -1.2 lakh cases. We may start seeing signs of reversal during this time, which means,for Maharashtra atleast, we would have crossed the peak.

Other two states which have started playing bigger role are Delhi and Tamilnadu. Looks like its just a beginning and peak of per day cases is yet to arrive. By the end of June 15 the cases in both the states would rise to ~ 42000 cases. Very soon, the two states would overtake Maharashtra and would start racing for number 1 contributor position.

The fourth state of Gujrat, seem to have kept it under control. It lost its 3rd position contributor rank to Delhi and has been enlarging the gap. We are not sure, if the migrant issue is going to effect the state in coming days or not. All in all, till June 15, it looks under control. But just in case, it looses control, we can expect very big spike crossing 1 lakh mark for the state by the end of this month.

The worrisome part comes after this. Earlier the contribution coming from these 4 states used to be arounf 75-80 % of total Indian cases reported per day. Now, the number has slightly reduced to 65-70 % range. Which means the cases arising from other states have started showing significant increase. We can, may be blame this to migration that happened in last 2-3 weeks time. If it is just the untested migrants getting tested after reaching their destination, then it is fine. But, if the numbers coming is because of the spread caused due to these migrants to their respective destination areas. Then there is a problem.

The effect is visible. My earlier projections for total cases in India by the end of the month were around 5 lakh cases. But, now, the estimate need to be revised to a number above 6 lakhs.

On a positive note, the recovery rate of India is good. Almost closer to 50%. The mortality rate seems pretty low, almost 2.77%. That is the strongest aspect about India. Our number may rise to any new height in coming, as long as our recovery rate is getting better day by day, we should be fine.

COVID projections: Mission "Begin Again"

So, India has finished its 10 weeks lockdown. While the number seems to increase at a much higher rate than earlier, but somewhere it also seem to be in control. This can be said based on the doubling rate. India went from 25k to 50k cases in 12 days. From 50k to 1Lakh in next 12 days. With that calculations, India should have crossed the count of 2 lakh on May 30 itself. But Today (June 01) is 14th day and we are still almost 9k behind that count. So, the doubling rate is increasing, which is good.

We need to understand one thing here, the number of cases is going to keep growing in coming days. As the number that we often come across is the total number and not the actual active cases ( the number left after removing number of cured cases), we will end up seeing big numbers on the screen. Our recovery rate is also good, reaching almost 50% now. That will create a better picture of the actual severity of the COVID cases.

Jumping into the number game once again, I projected a renewed number of 1,90,000 for India at the end of 4th lockdown. The projection was spot on crossing the projected number by just 600 more cases.  After 10 weeks,  now although, we are calling it as Mission Begin again, but still it is a kind of lockdown with little relaxed norms. After 2 weeks time, India is set to touch a new number of 3.5 lakhs at the end of 15 June, if the current trend is followed. And  this is good news, because with this number, we are actually improving the doubling rate. For India although, the flattening of the curve is not in site yet.

The trend of the major contributor, Maharashtra might be reversing in coming days. If the current trend continue as it is, we might see a number around 1.25-1.3 lakhs by the end of 15 June.

But, considering the recent decrease in the reported cases per day, a reversal might be insight and as per another projection, it may happen that Maharashtra will reach its peak around 92000 and start showing a reverse trend. There is a high chance that Maharashtra will give away its tag of major contributor to some other state (Mostly Delhi or Tamilnadu) and in strict sense start its "Begin Again" mission. Now there is some sense of suspicion regarding the reduced number of positive cases reported in Maharashtra. According to some news we came across, the government has reduced the number of testings itself . Automatically, the number of positive cases reported will also reduce. But lets not get into it. Genuine or fabricated, the number seems to have reduced and this has surely brought the peaking period for Maharashtra in sight.

The second biggest contributor (but still far behind in race to Maharashtra) is Tamilnadu. Although, there seem to be a big rise in its numbers, I feel, the state is also close to its peak, somewhere around 27-28 thousand, by the end of this 15 days slot.

But there is a catch here. Contrary to Maharashtra, where the recent trend is of decreasing number of cases, Tamilndu has started reporting bugger and bigger number of cases in last few days. And the increase in number is pretty high. If this near recent trend is not temporary and infact end up growing further, there is a large possibility of explosion of cases where the number of cases may touch upto 1 lakh cases by the end of June 15. That's why, Tamilnadu seem to be major contender to replace Maharashtra 

While Tamilnadu, atleast has a minute chance of reaching its peak by June 15, Delhi doesn't seem to be in that mood at all. In case of  Delhi, the question, will the increasing trend remain the same or enhance further. If current rate is followed, the number of cases may reach nearly 60,000 cases.

But,  if the rate increases even slightly, the number of positive cases by the end of June 15 will jump up to 90,000 cases. Thats why, Delhi becomes the second big contender to overtake Maharashtra. Worst part is, we are not seeing any signs of its peak in coming days, in fact till the end of June.

Gujrat is the fourth state with large number of cases. But, seems like the situation has already started getting under control. By June 15, the number may rise upto 22,000 cases. 

But if the last few days trend is to be followed, there is a big chance that, the state will reach its peak somewhere around 19,000 and will start dying down after that.

There is another projection, where enhanced rate can be considered compared to current rate. In this scenario, the number of cases here too, will show a big jump and may reach upto 32-33,000 cases. But, even in such scenario, the state is in no competition to either Tamilnadu or Delhi to become the major contributor.

While Maharashtra and Gujrat will start receding in coming days, the number of cases for India will keep rising. And here, the number will start dropping in from other states. Blame it on migration of workers or something else, but we are seeing a growing trend from all other states. With entry of migrants into the state as well as opening up of lockdown, it is going to be the test of every state, how they will manage to control the growth of COVID-19 in their respective states. Seems like few states including U.P., M.P. and Rajasthan have managed to  put some brake on its growth. What about others?
Lets wait and understand.

4th Lock down revised projections

We are entering into third week of lockdown. The situation seems to go from worse to worst. Yesterday, we registered record 7000+ number of cases. Almost half of it coming solely from one state of Maharashtra. With this migrant’s transportation across India happening right now, I don’t see any way the number coming down anytime. Situation of India doesn’t look promising. Last week, I projected a number pf around 1,82,000 cases by the end of 4^th lockdown. But looks like, it will rise a bit to 1,90,000 cases. The trend seems moving beyond cubical correlation and towards n=4 value. I am not showing that correlation at the moment, but this incremental trend of last couple of days, where per day cases is breaking new records, continues, then this number may reach closer to 2 lakhs for sure. Testing times.

There is no doubt, that the major contributor to this chaos is Maharashtra. As of now almost 36% cases are coming from this state, with the first state to cross 50,000 mark solely. This number is almost equal to the total number of cases OFFICIALLY reported by Pakistan. I am not sure how well the situation is handled by the present government of Maharashtra. Too many issues keep coming up. Very high population density like 7.5 lakhs of people living in 2 square km area of Dharavi (Difficult to maintain social distancing). Limitations visible over keeping strict lock down. Issues over migrant’s coming on road and so on. We can just hope, things will come in control at some point of the time, but definitely not till the end of 4^th lockdown. There is a high probability that the number of cases in Maharashtra itself will rise above 70000.

The next bigger contributor is Tamilnadu. But it is way behind Maharashtra. Infact, the total of next 3 states in list of cases, Tamilnadu, Gujrat and Delhi together fail to cross the mark made by Maharashtra. Such is the performance of Maharashtra. Looking at Gujrat, it has managed to keep the rise ratio to square term. And as indicated in last week projection, Tamilnadu which once showed cubic trend of increase, has started diverting away to the squarish trend. But Delhi seem to be growing with the same old cubic rate. By the end of the 4^th lock down, the three states together would contribute around 60,000 cases, much lesser than Maharashtra alone.

In a bigger probability, this would be the end of lock down era. Things will start smoothening out after 31^st May, even in areas which are red zone right now. Only time will tell, if we will a big jump in coming days. But one thing is sure, we are now entering the group of countries, which are red marked. Our yesterday’s number of daily reported cases stand 4^th after US, Brazil and Russia.  Difficult days are waiting ahead. 

                                                            SO, Gear up.

4th Lockdown end projections

I was not expecting, but here I am making projection for the end of 4th Lockdown in India. What ever claim people might be making, I believe, we are no where close to flattening the curve. Instead, we are now kind of drifting away from squarish trend towards cubic trend.  In last projection, I predicted 90000 cases for India. And as a matter of fact, on 17th Morning, the count was 90648. But on the day of the end of lockdown, it jumped by more than 5000.The square pattern is surely becoming a case of past. I am assuming in coming two weeks, the number will rise to any number  between 1,62,000 and more closer to 1,82,000. This, when the trend is not even completely cubic in nature. If the situation deteriorates, which is quite possible for many reasons and activities happened recently, I won't be surprised, if the number crosses 2 lakh.

But one more thing to notice would be the doubling time, if my projections remain true like last time, would be more than 14 days, which I guess is a good number. So, irrespective of the big number getting counted, probably, there is some kind of flattening, happening in the big picture as some studies might suggest.

The major contributor no doubt is Maharashtra. Unlike other states, it is very consistent. We hardly see any decrease in number. In every 3-4 days, it jumps to a new high and then starts settling down at that number for couple of days and then again takes a big jump. Just yesterday, the number jumped to a new big of ~2300.  After checking the trends of other states, it seems that the major reason for India tilting towards cubic trend is none other than Maharashtra, which itself has started taking that path. I predict by the end of this 4th lockdown the number of cases in Maharastra will reside no lesser than 58000 and probably somewhere closer to 68000.

Tamilnadu seems to be heartening story to me. Last time, I showed, how it is the only state in India showing cubic trend. But as I was expecting, it was a temporary phase unlike Maharashtra where the trends are consistently increasing. To me, it seems the trend is now deviating away and reducing from cubic correlation. If the projections are to be followed, the number for Tamilnadu may extend to a number somewhere between 22000 to 31000. How significantly the trend is deviating from cubic trend will be realized by seeing the number as far away possible from 31000.

Last, but not the least is the state of Gujrat. It was doing fine, following a squarish correlation when suddenly a big spike of nearly 1000 cases in a day appeared just two days back. I guess it was a once in a while cases and probably the trend will follow again as earlier. The thing is it will make it difficult to reach the zone of flattening the curve. All in all, a number closer or slightly higher than 19000 is what I would project by the end of 4th lock down.

I will be glad if this puts an end to my projection studies. It is disheartening to see the number growing so rapidly and all we can do is "Nothing".

COVID-19 New projection for 3rd lockdown end

The things seem going from worse to worst. Forget linear correlation, now we are drifting away from squarish correlation. The major contributor no doubt is Maharashtra. Yesterday, it reached a new height crossing mark of 2000 cases in one day. There are many crowded areas in Mumbai, where social distancing is just impossible. I believe taking some lesson from this crisis, the government will try to take some efforts in decluttering the chaos in places like Dharavi. There is hardly any living quality in those places and I think, this  crisis should be taken as an opportunity to bring some system in there. With the trend drifting away from square trend, I predict an increase in number of cases  to 30000 fro Maharashtra by the end of 3rd lock down.

Gujrat is another state rapidly emerging with big number of cases. Although situation has not worsened much and it shows just an increase of 300 more cases compared to earlier projection.

India is majorly reflecting the trend of Maharashtra with major contribution as big as 1/3rd coming from this single state. India also seem to slowly drifting towards n=3 trend. Little scary. I see the number growing to ~ 90000 by the end of the lockdown. 

 A significant rise is observed in cases in Tamilnadu. I am not sure, what has gone wrong there, but the rise is significantly higher than any other state in India. It is already spreading at n=3 rate. That means if on day 1, number of cases is 3, then on day 2, the number will try to increase to any number between 9 to 27. Which is a scary scenario.

I wonder if the governments in these states have any action plan. Are they taking any learning from other states like Kerala, which has gone down from state no. 1 to I don't know, probably 10th or 11th.

All in all, there is no easy way out I am seeing out of this crisis for India.

COVID-19 Projections for 3rd lockdown in India

Looks like my projections for India and Maharashtra fall well in line. But I am glad that Kerala proved me wrong and managed to deviate by at least 15 patients less than projected. While India today stands near 43000  (projected 44000) and Maharashtra at 12900(projected 14000), we can surely say that India and probably due to bigger contribution of Maharashtra in it, are currently following a polynomial trend (with n=2). Well, it is still not absolutely squarish, but, its almost there.

With the third lock down of 2 weeks starting today, I have conducted another projection till 17th May. Here it goes:

 With the polynomial dependence, India is looking to  reach to a big number of almost 78000-79000. One of the projections I came across had mentioned that the peak for India will be crossed somewhere around 23rd May with an estimated number of patients of ~75000. 

I tried to extrapolate the data to that date and it seems India will touch a mark of 1 lakh on 24th May. So, a lot now depend on how India perform in these 2 weeks. If we can curb down the trend. Will we be able to deviate away from this squarish trend. Now the fight really has come down to these 2 weeks. This period will decide, whether we have crossed the peak or we are going beyond squarish dependency.

Story of Maharashtra is nothing different. Infact, I feel, India is picking most of the signatures from the trends of Maharashtra. By the end of third lock down, which evidently has to be followed in the major cities of Maharashtra, it will be touching around 27000 mark. A lot now depends on how the Thakrey government manages to put a brake on this squarish trend.

I tried to look at other two states Gujrat and Delhi also, which have also started showing some rising trends.

Gujrat has started showing big rise in last couple of days. Earlier, it even did not exist on the radar. Till 15th April, it was going smooth. But then it sharted changing the gear and now it has starting picking up the squarish trend. If not controlled soon, Gujrat is on the way to become like Maharashtra. If deviated towards linear trend, we expect it to touch ~7500 cases, but if continuing with the exisiting squarish trend, we can see a number of ~11500 on board.

Delhi on the other hand is an ON and OFF case. It faces a situation that leads to sudden rise in numbers, then every thing seems coming under control. Again it looses its hold and the numbers start rising. But all in all, the situation is not as worse as  Maharashtra and Gujrat. We expect number of cases to be between 6000 to 7500 by 17th of May.

There are few other states which have started showing the high trends. These includes states like Tamilnadu, M.P. U.P and most recently Punjab is adding in.

I am following their trends. I feel these may not be permanent trends and would probably loose steam in a day or two. So, not putting out their data and number as yet. If they keep performing the same in coming days, will put separate post for these states.

How COVID numbers may stand at Lock down end in India

Everyone is fed up of COVID-19 and really looking for a day when we will start living without that fear. Every one is handling it in different ways, but every one in their mind is trying to make a guess of how the virus effect is shaping up and can we see a light at the end of the tunnel.

I also have been following it closely. Out of some conversation, I started following the growth especially in two states of India, Maharashtra and Kerala, which were competing at some point about who reports the maximum patients. We know how the two drastically different routes the two states have taken by now. So, I collected the related data about couple of states as well as for India from the site https://www.covid19india.org/ since April 06 and over the time. Based on the data, I have to tried to extrapolated it to check where will India, Maharashtra and Kerala stand at the end of the second lock down in India ends on 3rd May.

India is slightly deviating from linear correlation and slowly moving towards square correlation. I believe, the main reason could be the Maharashtra trend which pretty much every day contributes to 1/3rd to 1/2 of the total cases of India. Depending on how it varies in coming few days, by 4th May, India tally may stand between 36000 if it varies linear to 44000 it goes all hell to square dependency.

The worst effected state of India, Maharashtra has surely moved away from linear dependency and surely following a square trend. i.e. if on day 1, the number was 3, on day 2, the number will be higher than 6 ( a number otherwise possible for linear trend). With linear trend, the number on 3rd May will be somewhere near 10,300. But if it starts following polynomial trend as shown, it will be near 14,000. Surely a number we do not want.

So, Kerala, which was competing at one point with Maharashtra has performed really well. It was almost flattening the curve.  But noe, it has started again showing a linear trend. As of now, it shows no sign of going polynomial. I estimate the number to be around 525-535 on 4th May.