The surge of new coronavirus disease cases continued in India on Tuesday when the country recorded 83,809 new cases. This pushed the overall tally to 49,30,236, according to Union health ministry data.
The number of active cases in the country stand at 9,90,061, while 38,59,399 patients have been discharged, the health ministry data showed.
The country also recorded 1,054 new fatalities due to the disease and the death toll has now reached 80,776.
But as a silver lining, India also has the highest number of recovered patients in the world, according to Johns Hopkins University. India has seen 37,80,107 patients recover from the disease so far, which is more than Brazil’s count of 37,23,206 recoveries.
After the United States, India is the worst affected country by the coronavirus disease, followed by Brazil.
The health ministry had said on Monday that more than 60 per cent of the active Covid-19 cases are concentrated in five states: Maharashtra, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh and Tamil Nadu. It also said that the recovery rate in the country has reached 78 per cent.
“India’s journey of a fast-growing recovery rate has crossed a milestone on Monday. On a continuous upward trajectory, the recovery rate has touched 78 per cent, reflecting the increasing number of high recoveries per day,” it said in a statement.
Speaking in Parliament on Monday, health minister Harsh Vardhan said that a portfolio of therapeutic options for Covid-19 patients is being built by undertaking 13 clinical trials of repurposed drugs and harnessing traditional knowledge using the modern medicine approach.
In a statement in the Lok Sabha on the Covid-19 pandemic and steps taken by the central government, Vardhan said that a major focus has been on facilitating the development of vaccine and more than 30 candidates have been supported which are in different stages of development.