4,213 fresh cases reported in 24 hrs

As India begins to ease the lockdown, starting long-distance passenger trains in a graded way, the country on Monday saw the biggest jump in fresh coronavirus cases in one day, taking the total count to 67,152, with 2,206 deaths.

On Monday, 97 new deaths and 4,213 fresh cases were reported in the past 24 hours.

At the same time, the highest number of recoveries were also seen, with 1,559 leaving hospitals. Till now, 20,917 patients have been cured, taking the recovery rate to 31.15 per cent.

While health ministry officials deny any community transmission of Covid-19, they conceded some relatively large outbreaks were seen in some places.

They said it was important to focus on containment efforts to ensure India doesn’t reach the community transmission stage.

Dispelling fears that mild and moderate Covid-19 patients could transmit the disease if not tested before discharge, health ministry officials said there was nothing indicating any increase in risk in such cases.

Such patients, after discharge, will also follow home isolation for seven days. Mild, very mild and pre-symptomatic patients can be discharged after 10 days of the onset of symptoms and no fever for three days, under the new discharge policy.

The government also clarified the Aarogya Setu app was secure and would protect the privacy of patients. An official said that the data is erased after a certain point of time from the server.