32,000+ fresh coronavirus cases recorded, India's tally reaches 9.68 lakh
What's the story
India registered yet another biggest single-day jump of coronavirus cases as 32,695 people tested positive for the highly contagious disease on Wednesday, a bulletin from the Union Health Ministry revealed. With this, the national tally swelled to 9.68 lakh.
606 people died in the last 24 hours, taking the death toll to 24,915.
Nearly 6.1 lakh patients have recovered so far.
Here's more.
Data
India is steadily moving towards the one million-mark
India now stands at the third position on the coronavirus table. The United States and Brazil are the first and second worst-affected countries respectively.
Naturally, the alarming increase in daily cases has been pushing India towards the one million-mark. The fact that restrictions were relaxed last month aided in this surge.
However, a couple of local administrations brought curbs back to slow the spread.
States
Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu continue to suffer; cases, deaths rise
Maharashtra continues to remain the worst-affected state with 7,975 fresh cases being recorded in the last 24 hours. In just the last fortnight, the state added one lakh cases.
On Wednesday, 233 people died of coronavirus-related complications, taking the death count to 10,928.
Maharashtra is followed by Tamil Nadu, where 4,496 fresh cases were reported yesterday. 68 died and the death toll stands at 2,167.
Deaths
Bengal became sixth state to lose 1,000 people to coronavirus
West Bengal became the sixth state where more than 1,000 have passed away due to coronavirus. 20 fresh casualties were reported on Wednesday and the death toll is now 1,000.
In Uttar Pradesh, a total of 1,012 have died of COVID-19.
In Gujarat, the disease took 2,080 lives, in Delhi 3,487, and in Tamil Nadu 2,167. It has killed 10,928 in Maharashtra.
Details
Positivity rate is up, but recoveries increasing as well
The government informed that around 1.27 crore samples have been tested with the maximum samples — 326,826 — being tested on Wednesday. As compared to yesterday's 9.19%, the positivity rate increased to 10%.
About the recovery rate, which is heartening, the government said "aggressive testing, timely diagnosis and effective management of patients" helped.
The number of recovered people trumps the infected ones.
Prediction
IISc study predicted 35L cases by September in worst-case scenario
Meanwhile, a study by IISc warned that India will have 35 lakh coronavirus cases by September. If these projections, based on current trends, hold true, there will be 10 lakh active cases by then.
In the best-case scenario India will have 37.4 lakh cases by March 2021, the study said.
However, things may go terribly wrong and the number could reach 6.18 crore.
US
Separately, US recorded another spike, over 67,000 tested positive
Like India, the United States also reported its single biggest surge ever. In the last 24 hours, 67,632 fresh coronavirus cases were recorded. The US now has 3,616,747 coronavirus cases and 140,140 have died.
The latest spike was led by Texas and Oklahoma from where 10,791 and 1,075 fresh cases were reported respectively.
Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt has also contracted the infection.