India's tally tops 4.25 lakh; Centre says cases per lakh lowest in world

COVID-19 LIVE | India's tally tops 4.25 lakh; Centre says cases per lakh lowest in world
Healthcare workers check temperature of labourers at a camp in Mumbai on Sunday. PTI

New Delhi: Despite a surge in India's COVID-19 cases to 4,25,282 on Monday marking a record 14,821 new cases in 24 hours, the Centre said the virus infection per lakh people in India was among the lowest globally.

Citing the latest World Health Organisation (WHO) report to support its claim, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW) said the WHO Situation Report 153 released on June 21 shows that "India has one of the lowest cases per lakh population inspite of its high population density".

India's cases per lakh population are 30.04 while the global average is more than its triple at 114.67, the Ministry said.

The US has 671.24 cases per lakh population while the metric for Germany, Spain and Brazil is 583.88, 526.22 and 489.42 respectively, it said adding that this low figure is thus a testimony to the graded, preemptive and proactive approach the Indian government along with the states and Union Territories (UTs) took for the prevention, containment and management of novel coronavirus pandemic.

So far, a total of 2,37,195 patients have been cured of COVID-19. However, a total of 9,440 COVID-19 patients have been cured in the last 24 hours. The recovery rate is 55.77 per cent amongst COVID-19 patients, it said. Presently, there are 1,74,387 active cases.

The Ministry said the difference between the recovered patients and the active COVID-19 cases continues to widen and the number of recovered patients on Monday has crossed the number of active patients by 62,808.

The COVID-19 testing infrastructure is continuously being ramped up, the Ministry said, adding the number of testing labs have also been increased in this direction totalling to 985 - 723 government and 262 private.

Real-Time RT PCR based testing labs are 549 across the country that include 354 government and 195 private. The TrueNat-based testing labs are 359 in which 341 belong to the government and 18 are run by private entities. A total of 77 CBNAAT-based testing labs are functioning in the country, including 28 government and 49 private labs.

The total number of samples being tested per day is also steadily rising, as is the number of total samples tested, said the Ministry, adding 1,43,267 samples were tested in the last 24 hours. Whereas the total number of samples tested thus far is 69,50,493.

Surge in Covid deaths

India on Monday witnessed a significant upsurge in the number of daily COVID-19 deaths as it recorded 445 fresh deaths in the past 24 hours, while Goa reported its first death, Maharashtra continued at the top of all tallies.

On Sunday, 306 people had succumbed to the deadly disease and 375 and 336 two days prior to that.

As many as 13,699 people have succumbed to the viral infection till now.

Maharashtra remained the worst-hit state in the country with total cases crossing the one lakh mark - 1,32,075 cases, including 6,170 deaths.

Delhi took over Tamil Nadu to become the state with second highest cases. The national capital has 59,746 cases, followed by Tamil Nadu with 59,377 cases. Tamil Nadu has, however, more active cases at 25,866 than Delhi, which has 24,558 cases. The southern state also recorded its highest daily cases, biggest jump at 2,532.

Here onwards, every single death in Delhi has to be reported to the Centre according to new guidelines that also stated new containment and survey rules for the national capital as the pandemic surge in the city refused to reduce.

An 85-year-old man from Morlem village who had tested positive for Covid passed away at a hospital on Monday, recording the first death in the coastal state.

States with more than 10,000 cases include Gujarat with 27,260 cases and 1,663 deaths, Uttar Pradesh (17,731), Rajasthan (14,930), Madhya Pradesh (11,903) and West Bengal (13,945).

The total number of global COVID-19 cases was nearing 9 million, while the deaths have increased to over 467,000, according to Johns Hopkins University.

The comments posted here/below/in the given space are not on behalf of Onmanorama. The person posting the comment will be in sole ownership of its responsibility. According to the central government's IT rules, obscene or offensive statement made against a person, religion, community or nation is a punishable offense, and legal action would be taken against people who indulge in such activities.