Shawdesh desk:

India on Monday reported as many as 368,147 new cases of coronavirus disease (Covid-19) in the preceding 24 hours, pushing the country’s total infection tally close to 20 million cases.

To be precise, the country’s cumulative case count has now reached 19,925,604, according to the Union health ministry’s dashboard at 9:15am. As many as 3,417 new coronavirus-related fatalities were also recorded in the last 24 hours, taking the nationwide death toll to 218,959.

India is currently dealing with a deadlier, more infectious second Covid-19 wave that sweeps through the nation, crushing its health infrastructure and overburdened frontline medical workers.

The active coronavirus caseload, which crossed the three-million-mark last Thursday, currently stands at 3,413,642. This accounts for 17.13% of the total confirmed Covid-19 cases in the country. As many as 300,732 patients were discharged in the last 24 hours and so far, and 16,293,003 people in total have recovered from the viral disease, the health ministry’s dashboard displayed. With this, the country’s recovery rate stands at 81.77%, the government said.

Monday’s Covid-19 numbers, however grim, carry one silver lining — India’s daily coronavirus case surge has been showing a dip, albeit marginal, for two days in a row. The daily spike reached its peak of over four lakh cases on May 1, but came down to 392,488 cases yesterday, and lower still on Monday. However, the rate of new coronavirus infections continues hovering at alarming levels, with newspapers and websites littered with anecdotal reports over the past few weeks suggesting deaths and infections are being widely underreported.

Hospitals treating Covid-19 patients have filled to capacity, medical oxygen supplies have run short and morgues and crematoriums, even in the national capital Delhi, have been swamped. At least 11 states and union territories have imposed some form of coronavirus-necessitated restrictions. A nationwide lockdown on part of the central government, though, still remains out of consideration for now.

Source: Hindustan Times