Maharashtra cases cross 1.3 million-mark, 92,000 added in just 5 days

Maharashtra added a staggering 92,000-plus cases in just five days this week, taking the state's tally above the 13 lakh-mark, though new cases and deaths declined on Friday, health officials said here.

The state recorded 17,794 new cases -- lower than the peak single-day tally of 24,886 recorded on September 11 -- pushing the state's overall tally to 13,00,757 cases till date.

Adding 416 more fatalities -- down by 99 from the peak of 515 recorded on September 15 -- the state's death toll increased to 34,761.

After six days, the state's recovery rate dropped, from 75.86 per cent to 76.33 per cent, while the current mortality rate stood at 2.67 per cent on Friday.

Against this, 19,592 fully recovered patients returned home, taking up the total number of discharges to 992,806 till date, much higher than the 272,775 active cases currently present in the state.

As per Friday's figures, there was one death roughly every 3.46 minutes and 741 new cases added every hour to the state tally.

Of the 416 deaths, Pune led the chart with 56 deaths, followed by Nagpur (53), Mumbai (48), Nashik (42), Kolhapur (31), Sangli (20), Satara (19), Thane and Raigad (18 each), Ahmednagar (16), Jalgaon (15), Palghar (13), Aurangabad and Gondia (8 each), Latur and Amravati (6 each), Solapur and Chandrapur (5 each), Wardha (4), Parbhani, Osmanabad and Bhandara (3 each), Ratnagiri (2 each), Beed, Akola and Washim (2 each) and Nandurbar, Sindhudurg, Jalna and Yavatmal (2 each).

A day after recording 54 deaths, Mumbai again slid to the sub-50 range with 48 fatalities, which took up the city's death toll to 8,706, while the number of Covid-19 cases shot up by 1,876 to 194,303.

Of the total 8 Circles, the situation in Mumbai Circle (MMR, comprising Mumbai, Thane, Palghar and Raigad) remains on the edge as deaths spiral and cases pile up.

Fatalities in MMR shot up by 97 on Friday to 15,275, while 4,462 new cases took up its Covid tally to 457,919.

With another 80 fatalities, Pune Circle's (comprising Pune, Solapur and Satara districts) death toll increased to 7,477 while the daily case tally zoomed up by another 4,727 to 345,432.

The number of people sent to home quarantine increased sharply on Friday, from 18,83,912 to 19,29,572 now, while the number of those in institutional quarantine went down from 33,412 to 32,747 on Friday.

Meanwhile, Maharashtra Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari on Friday conferred the Indo-American Chamber of Commerce and US Consulate's 'IACC Covid Crusaders-2020' award for "Exemplary Work Done by a Bureaucrat" on BrihanMumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) Commissioner I.S. Chahal.

Two days after the Centre took note of Maharashtra's unique 'My Family, My Responsibility' Covid campaign, Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray announced that this will be taken to the next level of creating a 'Health Map' of Maharashtra for a healthier and happier population.

--IANS

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