2.08 lakh new Covid cases reported, highest number of tests in 24 hours set

NEW DELHI, May 26
India on Wednesday recorded 2.08 lakh fresh Covid-19 cases, maintaining the ongoing declining trend, though the 24-hour tally registered a slight increase from the number of cases reported on Tuesday. With this, the total tally reaches 2,71,57795, with a daily positivity rate of 9.42 per cent, the health ministry's bulletin showed. In the last 24 hours, over 22 lakh samples were tested for Covid-19, which is the highest single-day test.
India also set a new record with the highest number of Covid tests conducted in the last 24 hours at 22.17 lakh.
India’s daily recoveries continue to outnumber the daily new cases for the 13th consecutive day on Wednesday, as 2,95,955 recoveries were registered in the last 24 hours. With recoveries surpassing new cases, the number of India's active Covid-19 cases on Wednesday fell to 24,95,591, a decline of 91,191 cases in 24 hours.
A total of 4,157 fatalities were recorded in the last 24 hours.
On Tuesday, India's daily case dropped below two lakh after 40 days as 1,96,427 fresh infections were reported. On April 14, when the second wave of the pandemic was at its peak, the country crossed the landmark of 2 lakh cases. Since then, the number of daily cases has been on a steady increase and on April 30, the country became the first in the world to report over 4 lakh infections in 24 hours.
From the second week of May, the daily rise started to dip and reached the lowest on Tuesday.
Amid visible signs of the peak of the second wave receding, the Centre has asked States and Union Territories to ramp up vaccination as the Centre has provided them with stocks till June 15. The need for containment measures in rural, peri-urban and tribal areas, areas which remained unaffected during the first wave but could not resist the second one, has also been stressed.
"Our planet will not be the same after COVID-19. We have a better understanding of the pandemic now. We have the vaccine. India is proud of our scientists," Prime Minister Narendra Modi said this morning.
PM Modi further said: "I salute our frontline healthcare workers, doctors, nurses who selflessly risk their lives every day to serve others in need." He also extended condolences to those who have suffered and "lost near and dear ones in the pandemic."
The overall case count has surged to 2.71 crore. The active caseload saw a drop of 91,191 in the last 24 hours with 2.95 lakh patients recovering. The number of active cases this morning stood at 24,95,591 and positivity rate at 9.42 per cent.
Kerala and Tamil Nadu are witnessing a worrying surge in cases; Maharashtra, with the highest overall case count, has been registering a drop in cases. While Maharashtra logged 24,136 fresh cases in the last 24 hours, Kerala logged 29,803 cases and 34,285 cases were recorded in Tamil Nadu.
Amid lockdown, which entered the sixth week on Monday, Delhi logged 1,568 fresh infections.
The Central Government on Tuesday told States to accelerate the pace of vaccination. "Whereas States have been urged repeatedly to keep vaccine wastage below 1%, many States such as Jharkhand (37.3%), Chhattisgarh (30.2%), Tamil Nadu (15.5%), Jammu and Kashmir (10.8%), Madhya Pradesh (10.7%) are reporting much higher wastage than the National average (6.3%)," an official statement read.
India has administered 20 crore doses of vaccines so far. The Government aims to vaccinate all adults by year-end.
Worldwide, 16.78 crore cases have been logged so far, 34.85 lakh deaths have been recorded.
Hindustan Times and NDTV