New Delhi, April 23 (IANS) The Centre said on Thursday that the rise in coronavirus cases in the country has been more or less linear, not exponential.

The country is experiencing 4.5 per cent positive cases among the tested people, which are similar to the situation a month ago before the lockdown was imposed, added the Centre.

"No new case of Covid-19 was reported from 78 districts in the last 14 days. A total of 388 patients were cured in one day, the recovery rate is 19.89 per cent. There are 33 new districts in nine states from where no new case was reported in the last 14 days," said Luv Agarwal, Joint Secretary at the Union Health Ministry.

The total number of confirmed cases in India is 21,393. While 4,257 people have been cured so far, 681 persons have succumbed to the dreaded virus. The number of active cases in the country is 16,454. In the last 24 hours, 1,409 positive cases were reported from across the country.

C.K. Mishra, Chairman of Empowered Group 2, said, "On March 23, we had done 14,915 tests across the country and on April 22, we did more than 5 lakh tests, and as per a rough calculation, we have scaled up nearly 33 times in 30 days. We need to consistently ramp up testing."

Mishra said the focus of the government is on the districts.

"Our focus is on the districts now. The way positive cases moved in India, the growth is more or less linear and not exponential. Certain strategies are in work to contain it to a particular level. Beyond this, looking at the story of positive cases in these 30 days, we are more or less in the same position where we were one month ago. Among those tested, 4.5 per cent cases have returned positive," added Mishra.

He insisted that through the lockdown, the government has been able to minimise the spread of the viral infection, cut the transmission rate and increase the number of days in doubling of the cases.

--IANS ss/arm