COVID-19 cases rise by nearly 9,000; recoveries cross 1 lakh

India on Wednesday reported the biggest single-day spike in COVID-19 cases as 8,909 new infections took the total number of cases to 2,07,615. The death toll also spiked by 217, taking the total fatalities due to the infectious disease to 5,815.

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On the brighter side, the number of recovered persons also crossed the one lakh-mark to touch 1,00,303 or 48.31% of the total persons infected by the Sars-Cov-2 virus.

As on Wednesday, the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) had tested 41.03 lakh samples for COVID-19 through its network of 681 laboratories – 476 state-run and 205 private testing centres.

According to the Health Ministry data, Maharashtra has reported 72,300 cases so far, followed by Tamil Nadu (24,586), and Delhi (22,132).

Of the 5,815 deaths across the country, Maharashtra accounts for the highest number of fatalities at 2,465, followed by Gujarat (1,092) and Delhi (556).

At least 7,123 cases have not been assigned to any states, mostly due to discrepancies in the forms filled while referring the samples to testing centres and the current state of residence of the patient.

“The numbers are higher because we are testing more than one lakh samples every day,” a health ministry official said.

According to the ministry, fewer people were succumbing to the disease in India when compared with the rest of the world. India’s current case fatality rate is at 2.82% against the global average of 6.13%.