COVID-19: India witnesses 71,365 new cases; 1,217 fatalities
India on Wednesday reported over 70,000 new COVID-19 cases, a marginal rise of over 2,500 cases from the previous day. In the past 24 hours, 71,365 new cases and 1,217 fatalities were reported. The active caseload currently stands at 8,92,828, which accounts for 2.11% of the total cases. Meanwhile, India's COVID-19 recovery rate has also climbed to 96.70%.
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India on Wednesday reported a marginally higher number of cases than the day before. However, both active caseload and daily positivity rate continued to record a sharp decline. Notably, this is the third consecutive day when India's daily infection remained below the one-lakh mark. This comes after India witnessed a massive spurt in cases in December-end and at the beginning of January.
1.7L patients discharged
According to the Union Health Ministry, India reported a total of 4,24,09,052 COVID-19 cases till Wednesday morning. The death toll reached 5,05,279. With 1,72,211 fresh discharges, the number of total recoveries climbed to 4,10,12,869. The daily positivity rate also continued to decline and currently stands at 4.54%. The weekly positivity rate was recorded at 7.57%.
Kerala adds most new cases
Maharashtra reported 6,107 new COVID-19 cases along with 16,035 more recoveries. Kerala, the second worst-hit state after Maharashtra, reported 29,471 new cases and 46,393 discharges. The third worst-hit Karnataka added 4,452 fresh cases and 19,067 recoveries. Tamil Nadu, the fourth worst-hit state, witnessed 4,519 new cases and 20,237 discharges. Meanwhile, Andhra Pradesh reported 1,891 new cases and 10,241 recoveries.
India's second wave peaked on May 7
India's second wave peaked on May 7, 2021, when 4.14 lakh single-day cases were reported, over four times the number of cases reported during the first wave in mid-September 2020. Although infections declined after the second wave peaked, India crossed the three-crore mark on June 23. The country crossed the one-crore mark on December 19, 2020, and the two-crore mark on May 4, 2021.
Nearly 171 crore vaccine doses administered
Till 9:30 am on Wednesday, India administered over 170.8 crore COVID-19 vaccine doses. Overall, nearly 74 crore people have been fully vaccinated, while over 95.3 crore people have received one dose. On Wednesday alone, India administered over 45,000 COVID-19 vaccine doses till 9:30 am, including over 31,000 second doses and nearly 9,000 first doses, according to Co-WIN.
Nearly 1.5 crore 'precautionary' doses administered
Meanwhile, India has administered nearly 1.5 crore "precautionary" doses since January 10. On Wednesday, over 2,000 healthcare/frontline workers and over 4,000 elderly people were given the precautionary dose till 9:30 am.
5L COVID-19-related global deaths since Omicron: WHO
The World Health Organization (WHO) on Tuesday said five lakh COVID-19-related deaths have been recorded since the emergence of the Omicron variant. WHO's incident manager Abdi Mahamud also said that 130 million COVID-19 cases were reported during the same period. "In the age of effective vaccines, half a million people dying, it's really something," Mahamud said.
