In a massive spike, India reported nearly 200,000 fresh Covid-19 cases, with as many as 194,720 people testing positive, data published by the Union health ministry on Wednesday showed. Daily fatalities, too, witnessed a rise, with 442 lives lost due to the viral disease, the data further showed.
With this, the nationwide infection tally has risen to 36,070,510, including a related toll of 484,655.
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In a concerning development, the number of active cases is once again near the 1 million-mark, and currently stands at 955,319, an increase of 133,873 cases from Tuesday's bulletin. Also, 60,405 more patients were discharged, pushing the total recovery count to 34,630,536.
Recoveries, active cases and deaths comprise 96.01 per cent, 2.65 per cent and 1.34 of the overall caseload, as per the data.
On the Omicron front, the infection count stands at 4868, a rise of 407 from the the new variant's caseload on January 11.
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{{/usCountry}}Also, more than 8.5 million additional doses of Covid-19 vaccines were administered, pushing the total number of doses administered since January 16 last year, when the nationwide inoculation drive commenced, to more than 1.53 billion (153 crore).
On Monday, India began the latest phase in its vaccination drive, as 'precautionary doses' were administered to health care workers, frontline workers and senior citizens with comorbidities.