Maharashtra records 48,700 COVID cases; State records highest no. of daily vaccinations

On Monday, April 23, Maharashtra recorded 48,700 novel coronavirus cases taking the State's COVID-19 tally to 43,43,727. At present, there are 6,74,770 active cases in the State. With 71,736 COVID-19 patients discharged in the day, the number of recovered soared to 36,01,796. In a heartening development, Mumbai too recorded only 3876 new cases. 

524 deaths — 71 from Mumbai, 58 from Aurangabad, 41 from Ahmednagar, 38 from Nagpur, 25 from Nanded, 22 each from Panvel and Beed, 21 from Latur, 20 from Raigad, 19 from Satara, 18 each from Jalna and Osmanabad, 17 from Nashik, 14 from Amravati, 13 each from Pune and Sindhudurg, 10 each from Gadchiroli, Yavatmal, 9 each from Sangli and Thane, 8 each from Solapur and Navi Mumbai, 6 from Parbhani, 5 each from Gondia, Akola and Washim, two from Chandrapur and Nandarbur and one each from Pimpri Chinchwad, Kolhapur, Wardha and Bhandara, were reported on Monday. Out of the total deaths reported in the day, 293 occurred in the last 48 hours, 116 in the last week and the rest from the period before. Until now, a total of 65,284 persons in the state have died owing to COVID-19. 

So far, 2,59,72,018 samples have been tested for the novel coronavirus in labs operational across the state. While 39,78,420 persons are under home quarantine, 30,398 others have been admitted to institutional quarantine centres. The COVID-19 positivity rate, recovery rate and fatality rate in Maharashtra stand at 16.72 per cent, 82.92 per cent and 1.5 per cent respectively.

COVID-19 vaccination in Maharashtra

Apart from COVISHIELD and COVAXIN, the DCGI accepted the recommendations of the Subject Expert Committee of the Central Drugs Standard Control Organisation, paving way for the approval of Sputnik V on April 12. Moreover, the Union government declared that those vaccines that have been granted emergency approval for restricted use by USFDA, EMA, UK MHRA, PMDA Japan, or which are listed in WHO (Emergency Use Listing) will be granted emergency use approval in India. In a huge announcement on Monday, the Centre allowed the vaccination for people aged above 18 from May 1 onwards and mentioned that vaccine manufacturers can supply 50% of its doses to state governments and in the open market.

The private hospitals shall have to procure their supplies of the COVID-19 vaccines exclusively from this quota. Additionally, the private vaccination providers shall transparently declare their self-set vaccination price. A total of 1,27,67,290 persons have been inoculated in Maharashtra till now, 21,37,235 of them have received the second dose of the vaccine too. Maharashtra recorded the single-highest daily vaccinations on Monday with 5,32,322 doses being administered.