New Delhi: With the number of daily Covid-19 tests falling below nine lakh over the weekend, India saw a spike in the test positivity rate to 6.4 per cent Monday.
Meanwhile, the number of deaths reported in the last 24 hours was 579 — the lowest it has been in the last three months.
Active cases
The total number of active Covid cases in India has fallen below the eight-lakh mark, dipping to 7,72,055 as of Monday. The active case count has been on the decline for about a month now.
Number of deaths
India reported 579 Covid deaths in the last 24 hours, which is the lowest recorded daily fatality number since 18 July. The total Covid-19 death toll in India now stands at 1,14,610.
Mortality rate
Punjab, which has the highest case fatality rate in the country, is continuing to see a small but steady increase in the metric. At the end of last week, the state’s CFR was about 3.13, and today it increased to 3.14.
Maharashtra and Gujarat are the two other states that have been consistently reporting high case fatality rates. While it continues to remain 2.64 for Maharashtra, the value has reduced to 2.28 from about 2.34 for Gujarat.
Kerala has a very low CFR of 0.34. The overall CFR for India stands at 1.52.
Daily tests
India has conducted a total of 9,50,83,976 Covid-19 tests across the country since the beginning of the pandemic. Over the last 24 hours, there was a dip in testing to 8,59,786, which is characteristic of weekends.
Positivity rate
Due to low weekend testing, the test positivity rate increased to 6.4 per cent in the last 24 hours. The overall positivity rate, which is calculated since the beginning of the pandemic, is 7.9 per cent.
Recovered cases
With 66,63,608 Covid-19 patients discharged from hospitals in course of the pandemic, India has registered the highest number of recoveries in the world. Over the last 24 hours, 66,399 people recovered from the infection. The recovery rate is now about 88.26 per cent.
Total cases
As many as 55,722 people tested positive for Covid-19 in the last 24 hours in India. This has brought the total number of confirmed cases in the country to 75,50,273 — the second highest in the world.
High-burden states
In Maharashtra, 15,95,381 people have tested positive for Covid-19 so far, while 42,115 people have died from the infection.
In the last 24 hours, 9,060 people have tested positive while 150 have died. The state has 1,83,456 active cases of coronavirus, which is the highest in the country.
Karnataka has 1,09,283 active cases with 7,012 people testing positive in the last 24 hours. This brings the total number of confirmed cases in the state to 7,65,586. The death toll of the state is 10,478, with 51 deaths recorded in the last 24 hours.
In Tamil Nadu, the active Covid-19 case load is 39,121. With 3,914 new cases recorded in the last 24 hours, the state has reported 6,87,400 confirmed cases of coronavirus.
Over the last 24 hours, 56 deaths have been reported from the state, bringing the toll to 10,642.
Over the last 24 hours, Andhra Pradesh reported 3,986 new Covid-19 cases and 23 deaths. As many as 7,83,132 total cases have been reported from the state. Of these, 36,474 are active cases.
In Uttar Pradesh, 2,503 people tested positive for Covid in the last 24 hours, bringing the number of confirmed cases in the state to 4,55,146.
With 29 deaths in the last 24 hours, the state’s death toll stands at 6,658. The state has registered 32,896 active cases so far.
Tests and positive cases
Despite having the highest burden of cases in the country, Maharashtra reduced its testing to just 45,781 in the last 24 hours, causing a sharp increase in test positivity rate to 19.7 per cent. This is concerning, as a TPR of above 10 per cent indicates that the state is not conducting enough tests.
Uttar Pradesh has been reporting the lowest TPR among the high-burden states. Over the last 24 hours, the TPR of the state reduced to 1.4 per cent from about 2 per cent last week.