Coronavirus India: The country's recovery rate stood at 48.36 per cent this morning.
India has 2,46,628 coronavirus cases, data from the Union Health Ministry showed this morning, crossing the COVID-19 tally of Spain. India now is ranked fifth in the world in terms of coronavirus cases, after the US, Brazil, Russia and the UK. The total cases in the country include 6,929 people who have died of the highly contagious infection. With coronavirus cases on the rise, All India Institutes of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) director Dr Randeep Guleria, in said coronavirus cases in India could peak in two to three months but he maintained that there is no community transmission at the national level.
Maharashtra tops the charts in terms of total confirmed cases, active cases, recoveries and deaths. With 2,739 new cases in the state in the last 24 hours, the Maharashtra's virus case count reached 82,968. The third phase of the "Mission Begin Again", of easing restrictions in Maharashtra, will start from tomorrow. However, religious places and restaurants in the state will not open from tomorrow.
Coronavirus cases in Tamil Nadu, which has the second-highest number of virus cases after Maharashtra, touched 30,152 on Saturday. This is the sixth consecutive day the state is witnessing more than 1,000 cases.
The country's recovery rate - number of patients who have successfully fought the illness - stood at 48.36 per cent this morning. 1,19,293 people have recovered, the Health Ministry said.
Delhi - state with the third-highest cases in India - has recorded a sharp spike in coronavirus cases in recent days, registering more than 1,000 new cases each day. The city reported 1,320 new coronavirus cases on Saturday, taking its tally to 27,654 while the number of deaths climbed to 761.
Amid criticism and complaints over alleged lack of attention from Delhi hospitals to those who are turning up to get admitted, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal said there is no shortage of beds for critical coronavirus patients in Delhi and no one showing symptoms should be turned away. "Some hospitals are denying admission to COVID-19 patients. I am warning those who think they will be able to do black-marketing of beds using the influence of their protectors from other parties, you will not be spared," Mr Kejriwal said.
The central government had imposed the lockdown, dubbed the world's biggest, in late March and has extended it several times before announcing a staggered exit starting tomorrow. Amid rapidly rising number of coronavirus cases in the country, the government has allowed the opening of malls, restaurants and religious places with precautions from tomorrow. Intra and inter-state movement of non-containment zone people and goods has also been allowed.
The guidelines, which will come into effect from tomorrow, include measures like staggering visitors to malls and no touching of idols at religious places. Detailed rules were also issued for offices which have been allowed to reopen over the past few weeks. All establishments that come under containment zones, however, will remain closed as announced earlier.
The coronavirus pandemic has killed 749 people in the United States in the past 24 hours, according to figures released Saturday by Johns Hopkins University. The latest deaths bring the total in the United States to 1,09,791, and there have been more than 1.9 million cases, according to a real-time tally maintained by the Baltimore-based university.
Globally, 68,91,219 people have been infected with the highly contagious virus.
The novel coronavirus first surfaced in December in the central Chinese city of Wuhan.
