KUALA LUMPUR, May 17 — India saw its biggest surge in Covid-19 cases in the last 24 hours with 4,885 newly reported on Saturday. According to the Indian health ministry data as reported by the Times of India, this brings the total number to 90,674. Two days ago, there were around 80,000.
Saturday’s count was more than 1,100 higher than previous days.
The states of Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Gujarat account for the majority of India’s cases with 30,706, 10,585 and 10,989 cases respectively.
At least 2,045 patients were declared cured, with total recoveries numbering 34,223 or 37.8 per cent of the total cases so far.
There have been 2871 reported deaths making the death rate at 3.2 per cent, compared to the global death rate of 6.92 per cent.
Deaths in India due to Covid-19 are currently two per one million population. In China, it is three deaths per million. In terms of total numbers, India now has more cases of the disease than China where the pandemic allegedly began.
Nevertheless, the nationwide lockdown imposed on March 25 by the central government appears to have been successful in slowing the spread of the disease. According to the Hindustan Times though the third phase of the lockdown is scheduled to end today, several states are planning to extend.
