Active Covid-19 cases slumps below 3 lakh; lowest in 163 days: Health Ministry

In a significant milestone in the fight against Covid-19, the total number of active coronavirus in the country has slumped down to less than 3 lakh after over five-and-a-half months and the recovery rate stands over 95 per cent, said Union Health Ministry on Tuesday.

Rajesh Bhushan, Secretary, Health Ministry said, "In the country, active cases are less than 3 lakhs after 163 days. It is after almost 5.5 months, we have less than 3 lakh active Covid-19 cases in the country. It is a big achievement and credit goes to every frontline worker, administration and officials who are engaged in coronavirus containment related work. Currently, the active cases are less than 3 per cent of overall cases. The daily new cases are less than 20,000 after 173 days. More than 16.3 crore tests have been conducted so far."

"Across the world, new Covid-19 cases are rising including in USA, Brazil, UK, Russia and Germany. From Mid September, India is witnessing a sustained and continuous decline in new cases. The cases per million population for the world is 9,697, India's cases per million population stand at 7,300, Russia's 19,719, UK's 30,052 and cases per million population in US stand at 52,915," he added.

Bhushan said that the deaths per million population in India is 106 while the world's stand at 216.

The health secretary said that in the last seven weeks, the average daily new cases have shown a continuous decline in the country. "Only 24,135 new cases registered between 16-22 December against 46,301 cases registered between 4-10 November," Bhushan said.

Providing details of the COVID-19 situation in the last 24 hours said, "57 per cent of the cases in the last 24 hours in MP, Tamil Nadu, Chhatisgarh, West Bengal, Maharashtra and Kerala. 61 per cent of deaths in the last 24 hours in UP, Chhattisgarh, Delhi, Kerala, West Bengal and Maharashtra. 26 States and UTs have less than 10,000 active cases, now."

( With inputs from ANI )