NEW DELHI: There is wide variation in case fatality rates (deaths as percentage of cases) between states with over 100 cases as of Friday morning, with Madhya Pradesh (7.7%) at the high end and Kerala, which recorded the first Covid-19 case in India, at just 0.6%.
Maharashtra, with the largest number of cases, is number 4 on this list. Tamil Nadu and Delhi, despite having the second and third highest number of cases , have among the lowest mortality rates of 0.96% and 1.67% respectively.
What explains this wide variation? There are no definitive answers, but public health and epidemiology experts TOI spoke to have some suggestions. They said states testing more widely would have lower mortality rates as they would pick up even mild or asymptomatic cases.
‘Age could be a factor in death rate’
This would increase the denominator (the number of cases) and hence reduce the calculated value of the death rate, the experts pointed out.
Dr Anant Bhan, a researcher on global health, pointed out that if only severe cases or those reporting with serious symptoms to hospitals were being tested, the case fatality r