Over 17,000 new Covid-19 cases take India’s infection tally beyond 4.9 lakh; death toll at 15,301

India’s infection tally surged to 490,401 after 17,296 fresh cases of the coronavirus disease (Covid-19), the highest in a single day, were reported from across the country, according to the Union health ministry on Friday.

There are 189,463 active Covid-19 cases in the country and the death toll mounted to 15,301 as 407 people succumbed to the respiratory illness between Thursday and Friday morning, the health ministry’s dashboard showed.

It showed that during the last 24 hours, 13,940 Covid-19 patients have been cured. So far, 285,636 patients have been discharged from hospitals, taking the recovery rate to 58.24%.

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The government has said cases per lakh population in India currently stand at 33.39 against the world’s 120.21 cases/lakh. It has said deaths per lakh population in the country is currently amongst the lowest in the world with 1.06 deaths/lakh against the world average of 6.24 deaths/lakh.

There have been 9.5 million infections and 488,824 deaths across the world so far, according to Johns Hopkins University’s Covid-19 tracker.

Among the 28 states and nine Union territories in India, 12 have reported more than 10,000 cases and Maharashtra, Delhi, Tamil Nadu and Gujarat have the most number of cases pushing the country’s tally beyond the 4.9 lakh-mark.

A central team from Union health ministry will visit Maharashtra, Gujarat and Telangana from June 26 to June 29 and interact with state officials to coordinate with them to strengthen ongoing efforts for management of the pandemic, the government has said.

Maharashtra, which now has 147,741 Covid-19 cases and 6,931 deaths, has decided to extend some relaxations under its ‘Mission Begin Again’ scheme.

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An order, which was issued late on Thursday, said that barbershops, salons and beauty parlours in 19 municipal corporations earmarked as red zones, will open from June 28, while in the rest of the state they shall open from June 27.

Delhi, which has overtaken Mumbai to become the worst-hit city in the country, has 73,780 Covid-19 cases and 2,429 deaths so far.

Authorities will launch a sero survey to cover 20,000 people across the Capital’s 11 districts over the weekend to determine the spread of Covid-19 as the number of cases have risen in Delhi.

The National Centre for Disease Control, under the Union health ministry, and the Delhi government will jointly conduct the survey that will focus on antibody-based blood tests to find out residents’ past exposure to the Sars-Cov-2 virus, which causes Covid-19.

The sero surveillance is one of the five aspects of Delhi’s revised Covid-19 response plan that was developed after a meeting between Union home minister Amit Shah and Delhi government officials on Sunday.

Antibody tests began in Delhi in April but were put on hold after allegations over the quality of Chinese kits used at that time.

The government said in a release on Thursday that India now has 1007 diagnostic laboratories, including 734 in the government sector and 273 private facilities.

“From limited COVID-19 tests in Jan 2020, 2,07,871 tests were conducted in the last 24 hours, taking the cumulative tests to 75,60,782,” it said.