Mumbai reports 289 Covid-19 infections, 9 deaths; active cases below 3,000

Mumbai reported 289 new coronavirus infections and nine fresh deaths on Wednesday, while 1,157 patients recovered from the disease, a civic official said.

The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) official said with this, the tally of coronavirus infections in the financial capital climbed to 7,38,243 and the death toll to 15,968. For the third day in a row, the new coronavirus infections in the city remained under the 300-mark and this has happened for the fifth time in August so far. The city, however, witnessed a marginal increase in the daily COVID-19 cases and fatalities as compared to Tuesday, when it had reported 230 infections and five deaths. With 36,720 coronavirus tests conducted in the last 24 hours, the cumulative number of tests reached 85,06,864, the official said. The count of recovered patients far outnumbered the new COVID-19 cases. With the discharge of 1,157 patients from hospitals, the cumulative number of recovered cases jumped to 7,16,949, according to the BMC official. Mumbai's COVID-19 recovery rate is 97 per cent, he said. The official said the city now has 2,900 active COVID-19 cases. Mumbai's case doubling rate has climbed to 1,755 days, while the average growth rate of COVID-19 cases for the period August 4 to August 10 was 0.04 per cent, he said. According to the civic official, Mumbai currently has only two containment zones in slums and 'chawls' (old row tenements), whereas the number of sealed buildings is 35 (where a certain number of residents have tested positive). This year, Mumbai reported the highest daily cases at 11,163 on April 4, while most deaths in a day at 90 were recorded on May 1.