'The second Covid wave spread due to the irresponsibility of the Election Commission of India and now they are committing the same mistake.'
For the fifth day in a row, the active cases of COVID-19 remained below 9 lakh.
The COVID-19 vaccination drive was successfully conducted on the first day, Additional Secretary in the Union health ministry Manohar Agnani said during a press briefing. Giving an update on COVID-19 vaccination, the health ministry said 3,352 vaccination sessions were held and 1,91,181 beneficiaries vaccinated.
With 1,209 new deaths reported across the country, the toll due to the disease stands at 76,271.
Kerala, Maharashtra, Punjab, Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh have recorded an 'upsurge' in daily new cases of COVID-19, the Union health ministry said on Saturday.
It took 110 days for the COVID-19 cases in the country to reach one lakh and just 59 days more to go past the nine-lakh mark.
With a surge in coronavirus cases in Delhi and its neighbouring cities, migrant workers and daily wagers fear another round of lockdown could push them into a severe financial crisis from which they might never recover.
This was the fourth consecutive day that COVID-19 cases in the country have increased by more than 26,000.
The rise in the number of coronavirus cases has gained pace significantly. It took 110 days for the number of cases in the country to reach one lakh but just 53 days more to race past the eight-lakh mark.
This is the seventh consecutive day when COVID-19 cases increased by more than 30,000.
Active cases stand at 1,45,779, while 1,54,329 people have recovered and one patient has migrated. "Thus, around 49.9 per cent patients have recovered so far," a ministry official said.
The case fatality rate has declined to 1.83 per cent, the ministry data stated.
The sudden spike in cases of fever in India has claimed over 100 lives in five states, including UP, MP, Bihar, Haryana, and West Bengal. In UP, Firozabad and Mathura alone have reported 72 cases.
During the daily media briefing, Lav Agarwal, Joint Secretary, Union Health and Family Welfare Ministry, said that 16 districts in the country, which earlier had cases, have not reported any fresh cases for the last 28 days.
Of the 418 deaths reported in the last 24 hours, 181 are from Maharashtra.
The ruling coalition won 125 seats in the 243-member state assembly against 110 clinched by the opposition Grand Alliance to pave the way for a fourth successive term for Kumar in office.
India has registered over 9,500 cases for the seventh day in a row, while the one-day casualty figure crossed the 300-mark for the first time on Thursday. India is now at the fourth spot, only behind the United States (20,76,495 cases), Brazil (7,87,489) and Russia (5,02,436), as per Worldometer figures.
These states and UTs are Maharashtra (seven districts/municipalities), Telangana (four), Tamil Nadu (seven), Rajasthan (five), Assam (six), Haryana (four), Gujarat (three), Karnataka (four), Uttarakhand (three), Madhya Pradesh (five), West Bengal (three), Delhi (three), Bihar (four), Uttar Pradesh (four), and Odisha (five).
The report, however, shows that Delhi's air quality improved by approximately 15 per cent from 2019 to 2020.
India registered over 10,000 cases for the tenth day in a row.
'The roadmap ahead seems very difficult especially in the rural areas where there is very poor infrastructure, vaccine reach and hesitancy.' 'These are a deadly cocktail for the next wave.'
With the fresh cases, India's COVID-19 tally rose to 22.68 lakh, while the recoveries have surged to 15,83,489, pushing the recovery rate to 69.80 per cent.
The prime minister also asserted that in view of the COVID-19 situation, the states must ensure that people follow all health precautions such as wearing of face masks, hand sanitisation and maintaining an adequate physical distance with each other while undertaking rescue efforts.
Whether the third wave will ravage us depends on the pace of vaccinations, careful and calibrated opening up of establishments, and a strategy to contain the spread in specific states or pockets.
The case fatality rate has dropped 2.01 per cent, according to ministry data.
It is necessary to have a dramatic increase in the number of rapid tests for COVID-19 conducted on a large number of people and that should become the basis for estimating the morbidity and mortality due to COVID-19, not relying only on hospital reports, says Professor K Srinivasan.
Of the 1,48,266 beneficiaries who were administered the vaccine on Monday, 8,656 were from Bihar, 1,822 from Assam, 36,888 from Karnataka, 7,070 from Kerala, 6,665 from Madhya Pradesh, 7,628 from Tamil Nadu, 10,352 from Telangana, 11,588 from West Bengal and 3,111 were from Delhi.
The Centre on Saturday strongly advised 12 states and Union Territories reporting a surge in coronavirus cases to significantly increase testing and ensure people follow COVID-appropriate behaviour, noting that one infected person could spread infection to an average of 406 individuals in a 30-day window without restrictions.
According to the ministry's website, more than 70 per cent of the deaths are due to comorbidities.
In the wake of 73 confirmed cases of coronavirus in India so far, the Union health ministry has made functional 52 laboratories for testing samples while 57 labs have been designated for helping in sample collection for Covid-19 to enhance capacity for diagnosis and detection of the disease. "Following the increase in load of screening samples from suspected cases with symptoms and travel history to the affected countries, the department of health research/ICMR has commissioned 52 laboratories for COVID-19 testing in India," an official said.
The Tamil Nadu Toddy Movement had met both Chief Minister Palaniswami and Stalin to seek their intervention in lifting the ban on toddy-tapping and had submitted petitions, but there it remained. So the matter is being taken to the people's court.
According to the Indian Council of Medical Research, a cumulative total of 1,54,28,170 samples have been tested up to July 23 with 3,52,801 samples being tested on Thursday.
The plea also sought a direction to the Centre for providing all necessary medical equipment and other supports for the effective treatment of the children suffering from the epidemic disease.
We have no standard processes in place to address the more serious public health hazard of our lifetime, observes Aakar Patel.
There are 907883 active cases of coronavirus infection in the country which comprises 13.44 per cent of the total caseload, the data stated.
India's tally is now at 2,97,535, while the death toll is at 8,498.
Of the 56 deaths reported since Friday evening, 18 were in Maharashtra, 15 in Gujarat, nine in Madhya Pradesh, three each in Delhi and West Bengal, two each in Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Uttar Pradesh and one each in Punjab and Kerala.
While Bangladesh ranked 75, Myanmar and Pakistan are in the 78th and 88th position. Last year, India's rank was 102 out of 117 countries.
Vardhan had said on Friday, "Doctors at AIIMS are doing the best they can."
The death toll climbed to 20,642, the updated data at 8 am showed. Amid surging cases, the health ministry said it has roped in specialist doctors from the AIIMS here to provide expert guidance and knowledge support on COVID-19 to doctors manning ICUs in state hospitals, in an effort to reduce the fatality rate.
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