47,905 Fresh COVID-19 Cases In India, Up 8% Since Yesterday

In terms of the number of deaths due to COVID-19, the top five states were Maharashtra (125), Delhi (85), West Bengal (49), Punjab (31), and Kerala (29).

Up to 12,19,62,509 samples have been tested for COVID-19 till Wednesday, of which 11,93,358 were tested on Wednesday alone, according to the Indian Council of Medical Research.

Jharkhand’s COVID-19 tally rose to 1,05,224 on Thursday as 284 more people tested positive, a health official said. Three fresh fatalities pushed the state’s coronavirus death count to 913, he said. Ranchi district reported the highest number of new cases at 78, followed by Bokaro (40), Dhanbad (37) and East Singhbhum (29), the official said. The state now has 4,009 active coronavirus cases, while 1,00,302 people have been cured so far.

Serum Institute of India (SII), the world’s largest vaccine maker by volume, and the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), the apex body in India for biomedical research, today announced the completion of enrolment of phase 3 clinical trials for COVISHIELD in India. ICMR and SII have further collaborated for COVOVAX, developed by the US-based Novavax, and upscaled by SII, an ICMR statement said.

Delhi on Wednesday recorded its highest daily spike with 8,593 new cases in 24 hours, crossing the 8,000-mark for the first time. Its second-highest daily spike was on Tuesday with 7,830 cases. Delhi has recorded 85 deaths in the past 24 hours, the second-highest till now. The highest was 93 on 16 June. The total number of cases in Delhi stands at 4,59,975.

Odisha’s COVID-19 tally rose to 3,05,000 on Wednesday as 1,220 more people tested positive for the infection. Up to 15 fresh fatalities pushed deaths in the state to 1,469, a health official said. At least 1,340 more patients were cured of the disease during the day, taking the total number of recoveries to 2,92,477, which is 95.89 per cent of the state’s caseload, the official said.

The US has hit a record-setting 136,325 new daily cases of COVID-19, the latest data from Johns Hopkins University revealed on Wednesday. The country has reported over 10.3 million cases and more than 240,800 deaths caused by the disease, data showed. The third wave of COVID-19 infections is underway in the US as winter approaches.

Massachusetts-based Moderna Inc soon expects to have an announcement on the efficacy of its COVID-19 vaccine after it finished accumulating data for a first analysis of the vaccine, the company has said. Moderna is conducting a clinical trial of about 30,000 participants, with half of the participants receiving the vaccine and the other half receiving a placebo, which is a shot of saline that does not seem to have any effect, reported CNN.

The reopening of restaurants, gyms, and hotels carries the highest danger of spreading COVID-19, according to a study using mobile phone data from 98 million people. Researchers at Stanford University and Northwestern University used the data collected in March-May in cities across the US to map the movement of people. They looked at where they went, how long they stayed, how many others were there and what neighborhoods they were visiting from. They then combined that information with data on the number of cases and how the virus spreads to create infection models.

China on Wednesday reported 15 new COVID-19 cases, down from 17 cases a day earlier, the country’s national health authority said on Thursday. The National Health Commission said in a statement that one of the new cases was a local infection in Tianjin. The remaining 14 originated overseas, the commission said. The total number of new asymptomatic cases fell to six from 15 reported a day earlier.