Here's your 10-point cheatsheet to this big story:
The five states that reported the biggest spike in cases in the last 24 hours are Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Uttar Pradesh. Government data shows 66.41 per cent of total cases reported in the last 24 hours are from Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Uttar Pradesh.
Maharashtra, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh and West Bengal reported the highest number of deaths in the last 24 hours, comprising 74.58 per cent of fatalities during this period.
Around six in 10 people living in some of the biggest slums in India have antibodies for the coronavirus, indicating they have recovered from infection, in what appears to be one of the highest population immunity levels known worldwide, Bloomberg reported.
The findings, from a July serological survey of 6,936 people across three suburbs in Mumbai, may explain why a steep drop in infections is being seen among the closely-packed population, despite new cases accelerating overall in India.
Night curfew has been scrapped and gyms and yoga institutes that are not in containment zones have been allowed to reopen in Unlock3 - the third phase of lifting of coronavirus-related restrictions across the country - declared by the government on Wednesday.
In the fresh central guidelines issued on Wednesday, the government said schools, colleges and educational institutions will remain shut till the end of August. Metro rail operations, cinema halls, swimming polls, entertainment parks, theatres, bars, auditoriums and other places which involve large gatherings, will also remain shut.
In Madhya Pradesh, apart from Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, nine legislators including seven BJP and two Congress MLAs have tested positive for coronavirus. Four BJP leaders who flew to Lucknow to attend Governor Lalji Tandon's last rites last week have been found infected with COVID-19.
The United States marked a grim milestone on Wednesday when its coronavirus deaths topped 150,000 - far exceeding the toll in any other pandemic-hit nation. Brazil is second to the US in terms of cases and fatalities, and also reported a sobering figure as it surpassed 90,000 deaths.
The blizzard of alarming data continued too in east Asia, with China seeing a three-month high of 101 new virus cases on Wednesday because of a localised outbreak in the northern port city of Dalian, news agency AFP reported.
US biotechnology company Moderna's experimental vaccine to prevent COVID-19 induced robust immune response and rapidly controlled the novel coronavirus in the upper and lower airways of monkeys exposed to SARS-CoV-2, according to a study published on Tuesday.
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