New Delhi, Aug 4 (PTI) The Health ministry on Tuesday said it would be "thoroughly unjustified" to claim that deaths due COVID-19 are being under-reported in the country.

Responding to a question, Health Ministry Secretary Rajesh Bhushan said media reports claiming under-reporting of COVID-19 deaths in the country is "mere conjecture".

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He said that in the initial phase of the pandemic, the ministry had issued clear-cut guidelines in consultation with the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) and keeping in view the WHO guidelines on how to report deaths.

"We found in the initial phase of the pandemic that there were certain states which were not reporting COVID deaths of co-morbid patients as COVID deaths.  They were reporting them as death having been caused by that co-morbid condition. So we clarified that so that there is no confusion and written guidelines were issued," he said.

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Secondly, he said most of the deaths that have been reported from specific urban areas where even during normal times the death registration is very high.

"In Maharashtra the death registration in normal times (when COVID-19 was not there) is 93 per cent. In Tamil Nadu and Delhi, the death registration in normal times is 100 per cent. The national average of death registration is 80 per cent," he told reporters.

He further said that it was equally important to know what is the percentage of medically certified deaths to the total registered deaths.

"That is also an important aspect that we should be analysing before jumping to any conclusion. The national average of the medically certified deaths to the total registered deaths is 22 per cent whereas in Maharashtra it is 67 per cent, in Delhi it is 69 per cent and in Tamil Nadu it is a high of 85 per cent," he said.

"In such a scenario to say that deaths are not being reported is thoroughly unjustified," Bhushan said.

The death toll due to COVID-19 stood at 38,938 on Tuesday. PTI PLB/UZM SMN SMN 08042103 NNNNn use your bullpen a lot different, earlier in the game and try to get through that part. We had, you know, opener in both games, so we had to use a lot of pen guys."

A shorter game can take less of a toll on a team's bullpen, and it also presents a chance for a dominant starter to shine.

"Sounds obvious, but everything happens faster. It's almost like one good way to look at it is the first inning becomes the third inning," Reds manager David Bell said before Sunday's games.

"I remember in the minor leagues seeing a lot of pitching gems in the seven-inning games, so I think it's an opportunity for starting pitchers — to really from pitch one, you can see the end a little bit quicker."

Sure enough, Cincinnati's Trevor Bauer threw a two-hit shutout in the second game against Detroit. But that effort took 2 hours, 36 minutes, and the opener was played in 2:25.

That would feel short if it were a nine-inning game, but it wasn't like the Reds and Tigers just breezed through the day.

The Tigers had another doubleheader scheduled for Wednesday against St. Louis, but that was postponed Monday, along with the entire four-game series in Detroit, when MLB announced that seven Cardinals players and six staff members tested positive for COVID-19.

There was a time when doubleheaders were a constant presence in the majors. The Boston Braves played a record 46 of them in 1945, according to SportRadar. But last year, there were 33 doubleheaders total, and the New York Yankees led the way with seven.

Now these seven-inning doubleheaders are a possibility every team should be prepared to face.

"We'll do our best when that's in front of us, try and win those games. Obviously, it's a little bit different," Yankees manager Aaron Boone said.

"You know, it's hard to know how you attack those days until you're there and what the day before looked like, what the days coming up look like — who's on the mound those days? Those are all things you kind of factor in as you get closer. I don't know how much necessarily changed, other than it's a little bit different circumstances that we have to navigate." (AP)

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)