COVID-19: India reports 24,354 cases in 24 hrs, active caseload lowest in 197 days

In the recent update to the COVID-19 situation in the country, India on Saturday, October 2, has reported 24,354 fresh Coronavirus infections with 25,455 recoveries in the past 24 hours. According to Union health ministry data, out of the total infections, the active cases account for 0.81%, at around 2,73,889m, the lowest in 197 days. The COVID-19 recovery rate stands at 97.86%. Meanwhile, Kerala continues to add maximum cases in the total tally and has recorded 13,834 COVID cases and 95 deaths yesterday. 

To date, 3,30,68,599 patients have recovered from COVID-19. According to Health Ministry's data, the daily positivity rate stands at 1.70% that has been less than 3% for the past 33 days. While the weekly positivity rate stands at 1.68% which has been below 3% for the last 99 days. 

India's COVID vaccination drive

To date, India has administered a total of 89,72,61,764 COVID vaccine doses across 60,025 vaccination sites. The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare announced on September 21 that states and union territories have received over 80.13 crores of COVID-19 vaccine doses, with more than 4.52 crore balance and unused doses still available. In a major milestone achievement, India administered over 2.5 crore vaccine doses against Coronavirus on September 17. 

While on September 16, the Health Ministry informed that India has exceeded the average daily COVID-19 vaccination rate of the world's 18 major countries. The world's 18 major countries have administered 81,70,000 (8.17 million) doses of the COVID-19 vaccine. India has administered 85,40,000 (8.54 million) doses. Japan, the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, and Russia are among the nations on this list.

According to the ANI report, the government sources have confirmed that India will have over 25 crore doses of vaccines in October, including only Covaxin & Covishield, which will further be used for a large-scale inoculation across the country. And so, the Serum Institute of India (SII) has targetted to supply about 21.50 crore doses this month. This is considered a significant announcement as the Adar Poonawalla-owned SII since the beginning of India's vaccination drive has supplied 78 crore doses of its Covishield. 

(Image: PTI)