Covid-19 Cases in India: The recovery rate was recorded at 97.82 per cent.
India reported 30,615 new COVID-19 cases on Tuesday, bringing the active cases in the country to 3,70,240. According to the Ministry of Health, the daily positivity rate in India has been recorded at 2.45 per cent and the weekly positivity rate at 3.32 per cent.
A total of 75.42 crore tests have been conducted so far in India, with 12,51,677 tests held in the last 24 hours.
A total of 82,988 patients have recovered yesterday and the cumulative tally of recovered patients since the beginning of the pandemic is now at 4,18,43,446. Consequently, India's recovery rate stands at 97.94 per cent.
Here are the Highlights on coronavirus cases in India:
West Bengal registers 439 new COVID-19 cases
West Bengal reported 439 fresh COVID-19 cases on Wednesday, 91 more from the previous day's figure, pushing the tally to 20,12,008, the health department said in a bulletin.
The coronavirus deaths increased to 21,079 after 18 people died. The disease had claimed 21 lives on Tuesday.
In the last 24 hours, 1,360 recoveries were reported in West Bengal pushing the discharge rate to 98.47 per cent.
So far, 19,81,238 people have been cured of the disease in the state.
The number of active cases now is 9,691, the bulletin said.
North 24 Parganas registered 95 new cases, more than double of Tuesday's 46, followed by 58 in Kolkata. The state capital had recorded 71 cases on the previous day.
Haryana Lifts All Covid Restrictions
The Haryana government on Wednesday lifted all Covid-related restrictions in the state, officials said.
However, the residents of the state are advised to strictly follow Covid-appropriate behavioural norms, including social distancing, an order issued by Sanjeev Kaushal, Chief Secretary-cum-Chairperson of the State Executive Committee of Haryana State Disaster Management Authority (HSDMA) said.
Gujarat Reports 884 New COVID-19 Cases
Gujarat on Wednesday recorded 884 new COVID-19 cases and 13 fresh deaths, taking the overall tally to 12,18,212 and the death count to 10,851, the state health department said.
On Tuesday, the state reported less than 1,000 new COVID-19 cases at 998 for the first time in nearly a month-and-a-half and 16 deaths.
Also, 2,688 patients, more than thrice the new cases, were discharged during the day, raising the tally of recoveries to 11,97,983, it said.
With this, the tally of active cases dropped for the first time after January 5 below the 10,000-mark to 9,378.
Of these active cases, 70 patients are on ventilator support, said the department in a release.
Night Curfew Lifted In Uttarakhand Amid Decline In COVID-19 CasesThe Uttarakhand government on Wednesday lifted night curfew after over one-and-a-half months and allowed various other economic activities to resume fully following a decline in daily Covid cases.
According to revised COVID-19 SOP, night curfew imposed in the state on December 27 to rein in a spike in pandemic cases has been lifted, and gyms, shopping malls, cinema halls, spas, salons, theatres, auditoriums and meeting halls allowed to open with full capacity.
However, swimming pools and water parks will remain closed till February 28.
The ban on political rallies and dharnas will also continue till February 28, the standard operating procedure (SOP) said. Hotels, restaurants and dhabas can also open for dining with their full capacity, but will have to strictly follow Covid norms.
Maharashtra Reports 2,748 New COVID-19 Cases
Maharashtra on Wednesday recorded 2,748 new coronavirus cases, including 111 of the Omicron variant, and 41 fresh fatalities linked to the infection, the health department said.
With this, the state's caseload reached 78,50,494, while the death count increased to 1,43,492, the department said.
On Tuesday, the state had recorded 2,831 infections and 35 fatalities.
On Omicron, a department bulletin said, "111 (new) patients with the Omicron infection have been reported in the state. All these patients have been reported by the National Institute of Virology (based in Pune, where swab samples were sent for genome sequencing)."
Of the 111 infections, Ahmednagar reported 21, Navi Mumbai (19), Jalna and Yavatmal (15 each), Aurangabad (10), Nagpur and Mumbai (nine each), Thane Municipal Corporation (6) and Mira Bhayander Municipal Corporation (three), among others.
Till date, a total of 4,456 patients infected with the highly contagious Omicron variant have been reported in the state. Of these, 3,334 have been discharged following a negative RT-PCR test.
"Until now, 8,904 samples have been sent for genome sequencing, out of which, results of 7,991 patients have been, received while 913 results are awaited," the health department said.
Karnataka Reports 1,894 New COVID-19 Cases
Karnataka on Wednesday clocked 1,894 fresh cases of coronavirus and 24 fatalities, taking the tally to 39,31,536 and death count to 39,715. There were 5,418 discharges, pushing the total number of recoveries to 38,68,501, a Health bulletin said.
Of the new cases, 835 were from Bengaluru Urban that saw 1,979 people being discharged and 4 virus-related deaths.
The total number of active cases across the state is now 23,284.
While the positivity rate for the day stood at 1.90 per cent, the case fatality rate (CFR) was 1.26 per cent.
Of the 24 deaths, four are from Bengaluru Urban; Ballari 3, Bagalkote, Dharwad, Udupi and Uttara Kannada 2, followed by others.
After Bengaluru Urban, Mysuru recorded the second highest number of cases at 125, Belagavi 87, Udupi 69, Tumakuru 61, Ballari 56, Hassan and Shivamogga 50, followed by others.
Hearing Via Video Conference To Continue For Next One Month: Kerala High Court
The Kerala High Court on Wednesday said the prevailing arrangement of hearing cases via video conferencing will continue for the next one month or till the test positivity rate of COVID-19 goes down to 10 per cent, whichever is earlier.
The administrative decision was communicated in a notice issued by the High Court Registrar General P Krishna Kumar.
In view of the surge in COVID-19 cases in the state in January, the high court on January 15 had decided that from January 17 all the benches will hear matters via video conferencing and in exceptional cases, a judge may decide to hear a plea in physical mode.
Presently, the test positivity rate in the state is around 16 per cent.
COVID-19: Tripura Reports 120 Omicron Cases
A total of 120 Omicron cases were detected in Tripura on Wednesday. Out of 231 samples sent to the National Institute of Biomedical Genomics (NIBG) for Genome sequencing in the month of January, 120 samples were found to be positive.
The samples were sent to NIBG in two separate sets--samples collected between January 1 to 15 and samples collected between January 16 to 31.
A total of eight samples were found positive in the first 69 samples randomly selected from the collected swab samples between January to 15 while the rest of 112 samples came positive out of 162 samples collected in the next half of the month.
Sources in the health department, however, said that there are no reasons to worry as the positivity rate in the state is declining and the pace of fresh transmission is very less. The highest number of Omicron cases are detected in Tripura's West district.
"A total of 76 cases are from West Tripura district while North Tripura has five cases, Unakoti has five cases, Khowai has six cases, Sepahijala reported 14 cases, four samples from Tripura's Gomati district, and ten cases are found in Tripura's South Tripura district", said sources in the state health department.
The present positivity rate in Tripura stands at 0.35 percent and altogether ten fresh cases were detected in the last 24 hours.
No new COVID-19 death recorded in Mumbai for second day in row
Mumbai did not record any death linked to COVID-19 for the second consecutive day on Wednesday, while 255 people tested positive for the infection, the civic body said.
With the new cases, the infection tally in the metropolis rose to 10,54,732, while the death count remained unchanged at 16,685, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) said in its bulletin.
On Tuesday, Mumbai did not witness any death due to the virus. Prior to that, it had not reported any fatality on January 2. So this is for the third time this year that the city did not witness any case.
Also, this is for the third day in a row that Mumbai registered less than 300 COVID-19 cases. Besides this, the metropolis does not have any sealed building and containment zones for the seventh consecutive day.
Mumbai's case positivity rate stands at 0.83 per cent.
In the last 24 hours, 30,371 COVID-19 tests, around 5,000 more as compared to the previous day, were carried out in the city, which took the test count to 1,58,90,587.
As 439 more patients recovered and got discharge during the day, the recovery count grew to 10,33,071 and the city's rate of recovery is 98 per cent, the health bulletin said.
Mumbai's case doubling rate jumped to 2,205 days, while the overall growth rate of COVID-19 cases for the period between February 9 and 15 is 0.03 per cent.
Kerala records 12,223 fresh COVID-19 cases, 338 deaths
The daily COVID-19 cases in Kerala saw a marginal increase on Wednesday also with the state recording 12,223 fresh infections which raised the total caseload to 64,40,371. The southern state had reported 11,776 fresh cases on Tuesday after the daily infections had dropped below 10,000 on Monday.
Kerala, on Wednesday, also reported 338 deaths which raised the total fatalities to 63,019, a government release said.
Of the deaths, 25 were reported in the last 24 hours, 118 were those which occurred in the last few days but were not recorded due to late receipt of documents and 195 were designated as COVID-19 deaths after receiving appeals based on the new guidelines of the Centre and the directions of the Supreme Court, the release said.
With 21,906 more people recovering from the virus since Tuesday, the total recoveries in the state reached 62,62,770.
As the number of recoveries were more than the new COVID-19 cases, the active cases in the state went down to 1,13,798, the release said.
On Tuesday, the number of active cases was 1,23,825.
As many as 77,598 samples were tested in the last 24 hours.
Goa achieves 100% COVID-19 vaccination target
The entire eligible population in Goa has received both the doses of anti-coronavirus vaccines, a health official said on Wednesday.
With this, Goa's Directorate of Health Services has decided to close down all its COVID-19 vaccination centres and integrate them into the normal immunisation programme, the official said.
"The state has registered 100 per cent vaccination of the second dose of anti-coronavirus vaccines. As the process has completed, the COVID-19 vaccination centres in the state will be shut and the programme will be integrated with normal immunisation programme," Dr Ira Almeida, director of Health Services, Goa, told reporters here.
Dr Rajendra Borkar, state immunisation officer, said that the target of vaccinating 11.66 lakh eligible beneficiaries of the vaccine has been completed as they were administered both the doses.
COVID-19: Fresh infections, active cases dip in PuducherryThe union territory of Puducherry witnessed a further dip in number of daily coronavirus cases logging 53 infections in the last 24 hours, a senior Health department official said on Wednesday. The union territory had logged 68 cases on Tuesday, Director of the Department of Health G Sriramulu said in a release.
The 53 new cases were identified at the end of the examination of 2,019 samples and were spread over Puducherry (35), Mahe (8), Karaikal (6) and Yanam (four), he added. The total caseload rose to 1,65,416.
The number of active cases came down to 736 as against the 900 as of Tuesday, he said, adding 34 patients were undergoing treatment in hospitals while the remaining 702 were in home quarantine.
The Health department Director said there was no fresh fatality in any of the four regions of Puducherry, Karaikal, Mahe and Yanam during the last 24 hours ending 10 AM on Wednesday and the fatalities remained at 1,959.
Sriramulu said 217 patients recovered and were discharged during the last 24 hours while the overall recoveries climbed to 1,62,721.
The Health Department has so far tested 21,96,107 samples and found 18,39,916 out of them to be negative.
58 New Covid Cases In Ladakh
Ladakh reported 58 fresh Covid cases, taking the infection tally to 27,594, officials said on Wednesday. The number of active cases stands at 523, including 404 in Leh and 119 cases in Kargil, they said.
The Union Territory has recorded 227 Covid-related deaths -- 168 in Leh and 59 in Kargil, they said. No death was reported on Tuesday, officials said.
As many as 57 patients, 34 in Leh and 23 in Kargil, were cured and discharged from hospitals, taking the overall recoveries to 26,844, they said. Of the 58 new cases, 43 were from Leh and 15 from Kargil, officials said, adding that a total of 1,193 sample reports in Ladakh were found negative.
India administers over 173.86 crore COVID-19 vaccine doses so far
India's cumulative COVID-19 vaccination coverage exceeded 173.86 crore on Wednesday with the administration of over 41.54 lakh vaccine doses in the last 24 hours, said the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.
As per the health ministry, with the administration of 41,54,476 vaccine doses in the last 24 hours, India's COVID-19 vaccination coverage reached 1,73,86,81,675 doses, as per provisional reports till 7 am today.
This has been achieved through 1,95,98,966 sessions, it added.
Of the total doses administered so far, 1,03,99,960 health care workers received the first dose and 99,39,631 second vaccine doses; 1,84,06,271 front line workers were administered the first dose and 1,73,92,895 vaccine doses given as the second dose to front line workers.
According to the health ministry, 4,90,49,014 vaccine doses were administered as the first dose and 42,99,79,799 vaccine doses were given as the second dose in the age group 18-44 years.
Fresh Infections, Active Cases Dip In Puducherry
The union territory of Puducherry witnessed a further dip in number of daily coronavirus cases logging 53 infections in the last 24 hours on Wednesday. The union territory had logged 68 cases on Tuesday. The 53 new cases were identified at the end of the examination of 2,019 samples and were spread over Puducherry (35), Mahe (8), Karaikal (6) and Yanam (four). The total caseload rose to 1,65,416.
Vistara gradually restoring certain services to pre-Covid levelsFull-service carrier Vistara on Wednesday said it is gradually resuming certain services that were suspended temporarily due to the pandemic.
The airline also plans to improve its inflight entertainment offerings across its domestic and international network by introducing a wider variety of content, Vistara said in a statement.
Omicron Threat Remains High In East Europe: WHOA new wave of infections from the Omicron variant of the coronavirus is moving towards the east of Europe, the World Health Organization said on Tuesday, urging authorities to improve vaccination and other measures.
Coronavirus LIVE Updates: Arunachal Pradesh Reports 44 New COVID-19 Cases
Arunachal Pradesh's COVID-19 caseload rose to 64,110 on Wednesday after 44 more people tested positive for the infection. Of the 44 fresh cases, eight were registered from Namsai, seven from Changlang, six from the Capital Complex Region, four from Upper Siang and three each from West Kameng, Tawang and Longding district respectively.
COVID-19 UPDATE
173.86 cr vaccine doses have been administered so far under Nationwide Vaccination Drive
India's Active caseload currently stands at 3,70,240
Active cases stand at 0.87%
Recovery Rate currently at 97.94%
82,988 recoveries in the last 24 hours increases Total Recoveries to
4,18,43,446
30,615 new cases recorded in the last 24 hours
Daily positivity rate (2.45%)
Weekly Positivity Rate (3.32%)
75.42 cr Total Tests conducted so far; 12,51,677 tests conducted in the last 24 hours
Coronavirus LIVE Updates: Mizoram Reports 1,616 New COVID-19 Cases
Mizoram reported 1,616 fresh COVID cases and one death in the last 24 hours, informed the state Department of Information and Public Relations (DIPR) on Wednesday. The state also reported 11469 active COVID-19 cases.
Omicron Threat Remains High In East Europe: WHOA new wave of infections from the Omicron variant of the coronavirus is moving towards the east of Europe, the World Health Organization said on Tuesday, urging authorities to improve vaccination and other measures.