India crossed six million COVID-19 cases after reporting 82,170 new cases in the last 24 hours. The country took 12 days to report 1 million new cases, according to the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare COVID-19 dashboard. Along with this, there are more than five million patients who recovered from COVID-19
While it took the country 11 days to make the jump from 40 lakh to 50 lakh cases, the increase from 50 lakh to 60 lakh cases took one extra day. This increase in duration is due to the decrease in the weekly average number of new cases reported by the country. However, experts have also pointed out that in the same duration, the number of tests conducted in the country also decreased.
India crossed the five million mark on September 15. The country reported 97,894 new cases on September 17- the highest ever globally. Since then, the number of daily cases detected in the country have been decreasing. In the same period, however, there have been 9 days when the positivity rate has crossed 8% as the number of tests conducted has also decreased.
India only ranks behind the US which has reported over 70 lakh cases. Despite ranking second, India is showing the fastest growth in total number of cases. India's growth to six million came in a period of 242 days as the first case was reported on January 30 in the country. The first million cases were reported in 169 days. India crossed the two million case- mark after recording the new million cases in a span of 22 days. The next million cases were reported in 16 days as the country breached the three million mark. It took the country 13 days to report the fourth million while the fifth came in a span of 11 days. Noticeably, it took the country a day longer to cross the six-million mark.
The infographic below shows India's trajectory from the first case reported on January 30 to crossing 6 million cases on September 27.
Mortality
On September 16, with 1290 new deaths, the country reported its highest ever one-day COVID-19 deaths. The death toll has been ranging between 1030- 1250 since September 16. India's current mortality rate stands at 1.57%
The country ranks third with 95,542 deaths. US with over 2.04 lakh deaths and Brazil with 1.41 lakh deaths are at the top two positions.
Recovered And Active Cases
More than 10 lakh people recovered in India in a span of 11 days. The recovery rate is currently at 82.58%. In the past fortnight, the country reported a higher number of recovered cases than new cases for 8 days. On September 22, the country reported more than 1 lakh recoveries in a single day, the highest in any country.
Currently, only 15.85% of the total cases are active in the country.
Testing
India has conducted over 7 crore COVID-19 tests. These include the RT-PCR, Rapid Antigen Tests, TrueNat and CBNAAT tests. The government has not provided the breakdown of the number of tests under each category.
According to the World Health Organization, a country is said to have the pandemic under control if the positivity rate is at 5%. Positivity rate is the number of samples testing positive from the total samples that are tested for positivity.
Since reporting five million cases, India conducted over 1.2 crore tests with an average positivity rate of 8.77%. To follow the WHO's definition of having the pandemic under control, the country has to increase its testing capacity.
Representation Of States
The 10 states of Maharashtra, Karnataka, Kerala, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh, Odisha, Delhi, West Bengal, and Madhya Pradesh represented 79% of the new cases detected in the last 24 hours.
Vaccines
While the clinical trials for Bharat Biotech and Zydus Cadilla's indigenous vaccine and Serum Institute of India's Phase III trials of the Oxford-Astrazeneca vaccine are underway, other vaccines are also going to be manufactured by Indian countries.
Dr. Reddy's entered into an agreement to produce Russia's Sputnik vaccine. Both Bharat Biotech and Serum Institute of India have partnered with international pharmaceuticals to manufacture vaccines that would be administered intranasally.
