Covid-19 India Updates: Daily Deaths Inch Up, Fresh Infections At 30,948
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Deaths due to coronavirus inched back up after a day’s blip amid concerns over a third wave of the pandemic.
India reported 403 casualties in the last 24 hours, taking the toll count to 4.3 lakh in the world’s second-most populous country, according to the Health Ministry’s update as of 8 a.m. on Aug. 22, 2021.
New cases, however, dropped for the second straight day, and stayed below 40,000 for the ninth day in a row. Daily recoveries — though also less than 40,000 — exceeded fresh infections for second consecutive day.
Key figures:
Total confirmed cases: 3,24,24,234
Total number of active cases: 3,53,398
Total patients cured/discharged/migrated: 3,16,36,469
Total deaths: 4,34,367
Number of fresh cases in last 24 hours: 30,948
One-day recoveries: 38,487
One-day deaths: 403
The new Covid-19 cases have receded from the peak of 4 lakh touched early May amid the second wave of the pandemic. The number of deaths reported, too, has dropped. But actual casualties are feared to be much higher on account of underestimation because of under-counting, a backlog in the civil registration system and a lack of testing leading to Covid deaths being classified under other conditions like heart disease.
Active cases constitute 1.09% of India’s total Covid caseload, while recoveries constitute 97.57%.
Meanwhile, India has vaccinated 58.1 crore people, with 52.2 lakh doses administered in the last 24 hours, according to the Health Ministry. Total number of tests done during the previous day was 15.9 lakh.
India's drug regulator, on Friday, gave emergency use authorisation to a Covid-19 vaccine developed by Zydus Cadila Ltd. The DNA-based shot will be administered to all above 12 years of age, the Ministry of Science & Technology said in a media statement. This is the first jab allowed for population younger than 18 years of age.
Zydus Cadila hopes to supply 3-5 crore doses by the end of January 2022.
This comes as a mathematical model by researchers, who accurately predicted the tapering of a brutal surge of cases earlier this year, said the nation is likely to see a rise in Covid-19 infections building into a third wave, albeit smaller, that may peak in October, Bloomberg reported.
The country, according to estimates by researchers led by Mathukumalli Vidyasagar and Manindra Agrawal at Indian Institute of Technology in Hyderabad and Kanpur, respectively, may see worsening of its outbreak as soon as this month, with the next wave peaking in the best-case scenario with less than 100,000 infections a day, or nearly 150,000 in the worst scenario.
Global Update:
Globally, Covid-19 cases have topped 21.13 crore, with deaths exceeding 44 lakhs.
For more global updates, read here...