SRINAGAR: India added 374,608 cases of the coronavirus disease (Covid-19) and 5,594 deaths in a week, pushing its tally to over 2.58 million, data from the Union health ministry showed on Sunday.
There were 63,490 Covid-19 cases and 944 deaths between Saturday and Sunday morning as the country has reported more than 60,000 infections for the ninth time in 10 days, according to the health ministry’s dashboard.
India’s recovery rate is now 71.91% after 1,862,258 people, 53,322 in the last 24 hours, were discharged across the country. The country saw a record of highest single day recoveries on Saturday after 57,381 Covid-19 patients were cured. “To further build on this achievement, 32 States/UTs have exceeded the 50% mark. 12 States/UTs have exceeded the national Recovery Rate,” the government said on Saturday.
The gap between recovered patients and active Covid-19 cases has increased further and crossed 11 lakh with 1,184,814 on Sunday.
Data showed 49,980 people have succumbed to the viral disease. The government said the mortality rate is low in India “because of aggressive testing and early detection coupled with quick isolation and effective treatment protocol”.
According to the government, India’s case fatality rate (CFR) is on a “continuous positive slide” and currently stands at 1.94%.CFR is the proportion of incident patients dying because of a disease or injury in a certain time window.
The total tests conducted in the previous 24 hours stood at 868,679, taking the cumulative tests to more than 28.5 million, according to Union health ministry data on Saturday.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday said three Covid-19 vaccine candidates were being tested in India and the country is awaiting the go-ahead from scientists to begin their mass production. He added that a road map for the distribution of the vaccine to every single Indian in the least possible time was also ready.
India is the third worst-hit nation in terms of number of infections — only the US and Brazil have recorded more cases and have substantially higher death tolls from the viral illness.
