New Delhi: India saw a single-day rise of 8,318 new Covid infections taking the country’s tally of COVID-19 cases to 3,45,63,749, while the active cases have declined to 1,07,019, the lowest in 541 days, according to Union Health Ministry data updated today.
The number of deaths has climbed to 4,67,933 with 465 daily fatalities, according to the data updated at 8 am.
The daily rise in new coronavirus infections has been below 20,000 for 50 continuous days and less than 50,000 daily new cases have been reported for 153 consecutive days now.
The active cases have declined to 1,07,019 comprising 0.31 per cent of the total infections, the lowest since March 2020, while the national COVID-19 recovery rate was recorded at 98.34 per cent, the highest since March 2020, the health ministry said.
A decrease of 3,114 cases has been recorded in the active COVID-19 caseload in a span of 24 hours.
The daily positivity rate was recorded at 0.86 per cent. It has been less than 2 per cent for the last 54 days.
Weekly positivity rate was also recorded at 0.88 per cent. It has been below 1 per cent for the last 13 days, according to the health ministry.
The number of people who have recuperated from the disease surged to 3,39,88,797, while the case fatality rate was recorded at 1.35 per cent.
The cumulative doses administered in the country so far under the nationwide COVID-19 vaccination drive has exceeded 121.06 crore.
India’s COVID-19 tally had crossed the 20-lakh mark on August 7, 2020, 30 lakh on August 23, 40 lakh on September 5 and 50 lakh on September 16.
It went past 60 lakh on September 28, 70 lakh on October 11, crossed 80 lakh on October 29, 90 lakh on November 20 and surpassed the one-crore mark on December 19.
India crossed the grim milestone of two crore coronavirus cases on May 4 and three crore on June 23.
The World Health Organization on Friday declared the recently-discovered B.1.1.529 strain of Covid-19, first detected in southern Africa, to be a variant of concern and renamed it Omicron.
The classification puts Omicron into the most-troubling category of Covid-19 variants, along with the globally-dominant Delta, plus its weaker rivals Alpha, Beta and Gamma.
Nations rushed to ban flights to slow the spread of Omicron on Friday, while stock markets and oil prices plunged on fears surrounding the variant, potentially dealing a heavy blow to the global economic recovery.
“Based on the evidence presented indicative of a detrimental change in Covid-19 epidemiology… the WHO has designated B.1.1.529 as a variant of concern (VOC), named Omicron,” the UN health agency said in a statement.
As an independent media platform, we do not take advertisements from governments and corporate houses. It is you, our readers, who have supported us on our journey to do honest and unbiased journalism. Please contribute, so that we can continue to do the same in future.
