Hyderabad: Amid growing concerns over the spread of the novel coronavirus, All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) Director Randeep Guleria, one of India's leading medical experts, has asserted that the coronavirus cases in the country have not yet hit their peak or even plateaued.
The remarks come at a time when the infections are racing ahead with the country adding at least a lakh new cases every two days. It has logged more than 23 lakh cases and over 46,000 deaths so far since the first case on January 30.
Delhi
New Delhi: After a brief dip, coronavirus cases in Delhi are again going up. In the past seven days, more than 1,000 new daily cases were recorded daily, except on Monday, when 707 people tested positive. The increase is also reflected in hospital admissions. According to data shared by the Delhi government, 3,318 of 13,906 COVID beds, or 24%, are now in use.
The national capital recorded 1,113 fresh coronavirus cases taking the caseload to over 1.48 lakh, while the death toll has risen to 4,153, authorities said on Wednesday. According to a Delhi government health bulletin, a total of 6,472 RT-PCR tests and 12,422 rapid antigen tests were carried out in the last 24 hours. The total number of cases stands at 1,48,504. As many as 1,33,405 patients have recovered, migrated or been discharged, while the number of active cases stands at 10,946.
Bihar
Patna: Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar said that the state plans to raise the testing rate for COVID-19 to over one lakh per day.
Kumar said that state was at present testing more than 75,000 samples daily though the number of RT-PCR examinations, which he called "the most important," remained as low as about 6100 per day.
"The RT-PCR facility will soon be introduced at five more medical college hospitals which would help in raising the daily average by about 2300. Moreover, we have plans to purchase 10 RT-PCR and RNA extraction machines which would raise our capacity by another 5,000", he said.
The state government has set a target of conducting more than one lakh tests every day, he added.
Jharkhand
Ranchi: In the wake of spurt in cases of coronavirus across the state, it reported as many as 591 new cases in the last 24 hours. With this, the number of cases in the state has reached to 19,578 and the death toll stands at 194. The recovery rate of corona patients in the state is 54.21 per cent and the death rate is 0.99 per cent.
Rajasthan
Jaipur: Authorities in Rajasthan’s Alwar announced a lockdown on Wednesday in areas under the Kotwali police station area after a surge in COVID-19 cases. The lockdown will be in place until August 22. According to the lockdown guidelines, markets in Alwar will now open from 7 AM to 2 PM.
Meanwhile, amid a surge of cases, the Banswara district administration has decided to impose complete lockdown on every Sunday till further orders.
Uttarakhand
Dehradun: With 4 deaths reported on Wednesday, the death toll due to COVID-19 rose to 140 in the state and the number of coronavirus cases climbed to 10,886. Meanwhile, 217 patients were cured or discharged from the different hospitals in the state on Wednesday which took the tally of discharged patients to 6,726. Currently, 4,020 patients are undergoing treatment in the state.
Odisha
Bhubaneswar: The total positive cases of COVID-19 in Odisha reached 50,672 on Wednesday with the detection of 1876 new positive cases. With this, the number of active cases reached 15,508. Another 1,673 patients have recovered and the number of recoveries stands at 36478. Meanwhile, nine more succumbed in the state on Wednesday taking the death toll due to the dreaded virus in the state to 305.
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