Coronavirus / 14,313 COVID-19 cases, 549 deaths reported in India in last 24 hours

New Delhi: India saw a major dip in its daily death toll due to coronavirus disease (Covid-19) on Saturday after 549 fatalities were registered in the last 24 hours, taking the overall toll to 457,740, according to the Union ministry of health and family welfare. On Friday, 805 deaths were registered and 733 patients succumbed to Covid-19 on Thursday.

The country recorded 14,313 infections and 13,543 recoveries in the last 24 hours, which pushed the cumulative count of infections and recoveries to 34,260,470 and 33,641,175 respectively. The overall recovery rate from Covid-19 is at 98.19 per cent. The daily positivity rate, meanwhile, is 1.22 per cent and has been below 2 per cent for 26 consecutive days.

However, the active cases on Saturday saw an increase of 221 and currently stand at 161,555. But they remain below the 1 per cent mark of total caseload and have been the lowest since March 2020.

According to the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), 607,062,619 samples have been tested for Covid-19 so far of which 1,176,850 were tested in the last 24 hours.

In view of the current pandemic situation in India along with the ongoing festival season, the Union ministry of home affairs on Thursday extended the existing Covid-19 restrictions till November 30. Previously, these restrictions were in place till October 31.

"In exercise of the powers, conferred under Section 10 (2) (1) of the Disaster Management Act, 2005, the undersigned hereby directs that the order of the Ministry of Home Affairs of even number, dated 28th September 2021, to ensure compliance with Prompt and Effective Containment measures for Covid-19, as conveyed vide Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW), dated 21st September 2021 will remain in force up to November 30, 2021," the home ministry order read.

Meanwhile, the cumulative vaccination coverage against Covid-19 in India has exceeded 1.054 billion with nearly 5.7 million doses administered in the last 24 hours, the Union health ministry said on Saturday. Of the total beneficiaries inoculated in the country, 728,940,103 have received the first dose and the remaining 325,373,874 beneficiaries have received both doses.