As daily case load goes past 17,000 mark, 59% Delhi residents in favour of a 3-week lockdown

April 15, 2021, New Delhi: COVID-19 cases in Delhi are rising exponentially amid the SARS-COV-2 variant propagating in the city with the city registering a 4200% increase in its daily case load within the last 30 days. On March 15th, the city had 400 COVID cases which on April 14th has gone up to 17,282. The positivity rate is currently at 15.92%, with 767438 positive cases, which is the highest ever in the state. Notably, 91.92% of ventilator beds are currently occupied, with only 99 beds now available from the total 1226 beds.

As the daily case load sky rocketed in the last 2 weeks, LocalCircles saw thousands of posts and comments from residents of Delhi discussing public place restrictions, lockdown, night curfew and weekend curfew. To understand the collective pulse on what should be done to control the spread of COVID in Delhi, LocalCircles conducted a survey which received over 8,000 responses from residents located in all 11 districts of Delhi.

As daily caseload in Delhi goes past 17,000, 59% residents say impose lockdown

Taking cognizance of the drastic increase in the daily Covid caseload that has surpassed 17,000 the survey sought resident of Delhi’s perception if they support imposition of a complete 3-week lockdown in the city. In response, 59% said “Yes”. There were also 36% of residents who said “No”, while 5% couldn’t say. The question in the survey received 8,211 responses.

As daily caseload in Delhi goes past 17,000, 59% residents say impose lockdown

Percentage of residents of Delhi in support of lockdown rises by 275% in less than 3 weeks

At the end of March, when LocalCircles did a similar exercise, only 16% residents of Delhi who participated in the survey were in favour of a lockdown. However, with rising cases, people seeing their contacts in social networks struggling to find hospital and ICU beds, remdesivir, etc. many more are now understanding the criticality of the situation and as a result 59% residents of Delhi who participated in the survey concluding on April 15th voted in favour of a 3 week lockdown. It was categorically stated that while lockdown is imposed, all essential services must continue to function in the city so people do not face hardships in running their households.

LocalCircles has shared the findings of this survey with Office of Lieutenant Governor of Delhi and the Office of Chief Minister so as they discuss the Delhi situation and decide on the way forward, this collective public feedback is taken into account.

Survey Demographics

8000+ responses were received from residents of Delhi located in all 11 districts of Delhi. 67% respondents were men while 33% respondents were women. The survey was conducted via LocalCircles platform and all participants were validated Delhi residents who had to be registered with LocalCircles to participate in this survey.