6.4 lakh still in hospitals
As many as 6.4 lakh Covid-19 patients are still in hospitals in India as against 22.69 lakh found infected with the virus, 53,601 in the past 24 hours. The percentage of the hospitalised patients is, however, slowly coming down from 29.20% on Sunday to 28.66% on Monday and 28.21% on Tuesday.
The mortalities fell on Tuesday to 871 as against the highest 1007 on Monday, while the percentage of deaths dropped a notch to 1.99%, with 45,257 deaths in the country so far.
The recovery rate also improved to 69.80%, with as many as 15.83 lakh cured and discharged from hospitals, 47,746 in the past 24 hours.
The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) reports testing of 6.98 lakh samples in 24 hours, raising the total number of samples tested to 2,52,81,848.
Vaccine panel in action
The Centre has set up an expert committee headed by NITI Aayog member VK Paul which will meet on Wednesday to consider the logistics and ethical aspects of procuring and administering the COVID-19 vaccine, the
Union Health Ministry said. The committee on vaccine administration will engage with all stakeholders including state governments and vaccine manufacturers and its terms of reference include selecting suitable vaccines, their procurement and delivery and prioritising groups to administer them.
Responding to a question on whether India plans to tie up with Russia for procuring the vaccine which Moscow claims to have developed, Health Ministry Secretary Rajesh Bhushan they have made certain projections about the required doses. He, however, didn’t give any more details.