India Reports 8,309 New Covid Cases; Active Cases Declines To 1,03,859

The daily rise in new coronavirus infections has been below 20,000 for 52 straight days and less than 50,000 daily new cases have been reported for 155 consecutive days now. The active cases have declined to 1,03,859 comprising 0.30 per cent of the total infections, the lowest since March 2020, while the national COVID-19 recovery rate was recorded at 98.34 per cent, the highest since March 2020, the health ministry said.

A decrease of 1,832 cases has been recorded in the active COVID-19 caseload in a span of 24 hours. The daily positivity rate was recorded at 1.09 per cent. It has been less than 2 per cent for last 56 days. Weekly positivity rate was also recorded at 0.85 per cent. It has been below 1 per cent for the last 15 days, according to the health ministry.

The number of people who have recuperated from the disease surged to 3,40,08,183 while the case fatality rate was recorded at 1.36 per cent. The cumulative doses administered in the country so far under the nationwide COVID-19 vaccination drive has exceeded 122.41 crore.

India's COVID-19 tally had crossed the 20-lakh mark on August 7, 2020, 30 lakh on August 23, 40 lakh on September 5 and 50 lakh on September 16. It went past 60 lakh on September 28, 70 lakh on October 11, crossed 80 lakh on October 29, 90 lakh on November 20 and surpassed the one-crore mark on December 19. India crossed the grim milestone of two crore on May 4 and three crore on June 23. The 236 new fatalities include 159? from Kerala and 33 from Maharashtra.

Of the 159 deaths, 19 were reported over the last few days and 140 were designated as COVID-19 deaths after receiving appeals based on the new guidelines of the Centre and the directions of the Supreme Court, as Kerala state government release said on Sunday.?

A total of 4,68,790 deaths have been reported so far in the country including 1,40,941 from Maharashtra, 39,838 from Kerala,?38,198 from Karnataka, 36,463? from Tamil Nadu, 25,097 from Delhi, 22,910 from Uttar Pradesh and 19,462 from West Bengal. The health ministry stressed that more than 70 per cent of the deaths occurred due to comorbidities.

"Our figures are being reconciled with the Indian Council of Medical Research," the ministry said on its website, adding that state-wise distribution of figures is subject to further verification and reconciliation.

-With PTI Inputs