Covid surge: India reports 13,742 infections, 104 deaths in 24 hours

The death count increased to 1,56,567 with 104 new fatalities, the data updated at 8 am showed

Fresh Covid-19 cases are showing an upward trend over the past one week, with the country reporting 13,742 cases in the last 24 hours taking the overall tally to 1,10,30,176 on Wednesday, Union Health Ministry said.

The rise in new cases is almost 3,158 more than Tuesdays. India has been recording less than 15,000 new infections daily with the toll not crossing the 200-mark over the last one month.

However, the number spiked possibly owing to "mutations and new strains" as has been studied by the laboratories involved in Covid detection across the country.

The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare said that there were 104 more deaths taking the overall toll to 1,56,567.

Last week, officials said that the average daily new infections for the last 15 days were oscillating between 9,000 to 12,000 while the deaths were between 78 to 120.

On February 9, India had reported 9,110 new cases, the lowest this year so far. Last year, the lowest 9,633 cases were recorded on June 3.

As per the Ministry's data, there are 1,46,907 active cases at present after 14,037 patients were discharged in a day.

Till now, 1,07,26,702 persons have been discharged so far. The recovery rate has remained to 97.24 per cent, while the fatality rate is 1.42 per cent.

At least 84 per cent of the new cases are from six states -- Maharashtra, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Punjab, Karnataka and Gujarat.

Six states account for 84.62 per cent of the new deaths including Maharashtra, Kerala, Punjab, Tamil Nadu, Chhattisgarh and Karnataka.

The Ministry also informed that 8,05,844 samples were tested on Tuesday. The cumulative tests done by Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) so far stands at 21,30,36,275.

More than 1,21,65,598 doses of corona vaccine have been administered in the country since the drive began on January 16 after approval for 'Covishield' and 'Covaxin'.

As per the Union Health Ministry, India has become the fastest nation in terms of the vaccine doses administered, even though many countries had launched their vaccination campaigns much earlier. --IANS

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