India now sixth worst-hit by Covid; crosses Italy tally

India went past Italy to become the sixth worst-hit nation by Covid-19, with the country registering a record single-day spike of 9,887 cases which pushed the nationwide tally to 236,657.

India’s death toll due to Covid-19 rose to 6,642, with a record increase of 294 deaths in the last 24 hours till Saturday 8 am.

The country has registered over 9,000 cases for the third day in a row.

India is now the sixth worst-affected nation in terms of coronavirus infection cases after the US, Brazil, Russia, Spain and the UK, according to Johns Hopkins University data.

The number of active Covid-19 cases stands at 115,942 in the country.

A total of 114,073 people have recovered so far, with 4,611 Covid-19 patients having been cured in the last 24 hours, the Union Health Ministry said. “Thus, around 48.20 per cent patients have recovered so far," a senior health ministry official said. The total confirmed cases also include foreigners.

The health ministry said cumulatively 45,24,317 samples have been tested so far with 137,938 samples tested in the last 24 hours.

Of the total 6,642 fatalities, Maharashtra tops the tally

for 48 hrs after five employees, including a special director rank officer, tested positive

for Covid treatment in pvt hospitals at ~15,000 per day

tested positive after undergoing flight simulator training

claim to have developed a Covid test kit worth ~550 that can deliver results within 20 minutes

with 2,849 deaths, followed by Gujarat with 1,190 deaths, Delhi with 708, Madhya Pradesh with 384, West Bengal with 366, Uttar Pradesh with 257, Tamil Nadu with 232, Rajasthan with 218, Telangana with 113 and Andhra Pradesh with 73 deaths.

The death toll reached 57 in Karnataka and 48 in Punjab. Jammu and Kashmir has reported 36 fatalities due to the disease, Bihar 29, Haryana 24, Kerala 14, Uttarakhand 11, Odisha eight and Jharkhand has reported seven deaths so far. Himachal Pradesh and Chandigarh have registered five fatalities each. Assam has recorded four deaths, while Chhattisgarh has reported two deaths so far.