The downward trend in India's coronavirus cases continues as 55,342 new COVID-19 cases were recorded in the last 24 hours taking the country's Covid tally past 71.75 lakh, shows data shared by the Health Ministry this morning.
This is the first time since August 18 (55,079) that India has reported around 55,000 cases in a day, and second day when the total new infections were under 70,000 since the September surge of around 90,000 cases a day. With 77,760 new recoveries, active cases have further come down to 8.38 lakh. The total number of fatalities associated with the viral infection shot to 1,09,856 with 706 people succumbing to COVID-19 in the last 24 hours.
Meanwhile, Union Health Minister Dr Harsh Vardhan today said that a vaccine against coronavirus is expected to be available in India by early next year and there could be vaccines from more than one source.
"We're expecting that early next year, we should have vaccine in the country from maybe more than one source. Our expert groups are already formulating and devising strategies to plan on how to roll out the distribution of the vaccines in the country, who do we give the vaccine first and then of course we are strengthening the cold chain facilities," Dr Harsh Vardhan said during a meeting of the Group of Ministers.
