India COVID-19 Reports: India's per million per day testing doubled from 363 on August 1 to 600 now.
In a first, almost 6,000 more people in the country recovered from COVID-19 than were infected by the coronavirus over the last 24 hours, the Health Ministry said today as India continued to throw up the highest number of daily cases in the world.
At 66,550 patients, India reported the highest recoveries in a day on Monday, taking the number to 24,05,585, out of the total caseload of 31,67,323.
"Irresponsible, less cautious people who are not wearing masks are driving the pandemic in India," the head of country's top biomedical research body, ICMR, Dr Balram Bhushan said at the Health Ministry's coronavirus press briefing where officials shared the country's pandemic-related data.
The statement comes as India prepares to conduct IIT and medical entrance exams for lakhs of students in September.
Turning down requests for comment on the JEE, NEET exams situation, Health Ministry officials said India has one of the lowest Covid mortality rates and among the best recovery rates in the world.
"The recovery rate is now more than 75%. The country's Covid mortality rate - at 1.58 per cent - is one of the lowest in the world. The number of active cases is 22.2 per cent of the total cases, and the recovered cases are 3.4 times more than the active cases in the country," Rajesh Bhushan, Secretary, Union Health Ministry said.
The ministry has said that with an increase in testing the positivity rate has fallen to 7 day rolling average from 11 to 8 days in early August.
India's per million per day testing doubled from 363 on August 1 to 600 now. "More than 3 crore tests have been done till August 25," the Union health secretary said.
The official further shared that majority cases in India were not severe.
"Some 2.7 per cent patients are on oxygen support, 1.92 per cent patients are in the ICU and 0.29 per cent are on ventilator support," he said.
The meeting also took cognizance of the re-infection in Hong Kong and cautioned against alarm. "Don't be alarmed... it can depend on several factors," the ICMR chief said.