If Solapur had 100 cases last week and 200 this week, one would conclude that cases doubled, unless 100 out of 1,000 tested were positive in the first week, and 200 of 2,000 were positive in the second week, as testing capacity increased. Most local jurisdictions do not collect data on the age groups and disease profile of hospitalized patients, the length of stay of hospital admissions (2-3 weeks in the West, but shorter in India), the numbers transferred from one level of care to another, all of which hospital administrators would need to plan bed capacity. What India now needs is a simple count of how many of those tested are positive, and information about their demographic, socioeconomic and health status, so that we can take urgent steps to balance lives and livelihoods.