India's coronavirus cases cross 78,000 with 3,722 new cases, recovery rate is 33.6 per cent

India's coronavirus cases count crossed 78,000 on Thursday with 3,722 new cases reported in the last 24 hours as the recovery rate improved to 33.6 per cent from 32.83 per cent a day earlier.

The total number of cases stood at 78,003 of which 26,235 persons have been cured and 2,549 people have died. There are 49,219 active cases in the country

"In the last 24 hours, 3,722 new confirmed cases have been added," Health Ministry said.

Health Minister Harsh Vardhan visited the National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) and dedicated the COBAS 6800 testing machine to the nation. This is the first such testing machine that has been procured by the government for testing of COVID-19 cases. The machine enabled with robotics minimizes the chance of contamination as well as the risk of infection to the health care workers since it can be operated remotely with limited human intervention.

Harsh Vardhan said nearly 20 lakh tests for COVID-19 have been conducted in the country at more than 500 laboratories. He said the doubling time has slowed down to 13.9 days in the last three days. There are 14 states and UTs which have not reported any cases of COVID-19 in last 24 hours.

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Thursday announced the second tranche of Rs 20 lakh crore stimulus package with a focus on migrant workers, street vendors, small traders, self-employed people and small farmers.

During his address to the nation on Tuesday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had announced a stimulus totalling 10 per cent of India's GDP to rescue the economy reeling under the impact of coronavirus-led lockdown.

A day later, Sitharaman announced Rs 3 lakh crore collateral-free automatic loans for businesses, including micro, small and medium enterprises, besides Rs 30,000 crore liquidity facility for non-banking finance compes.

Sitharaman on Thursday announced the 'One Nation One Ration Card', free food grain supply to migrants and creation of affordable rental housing complexes (ARHC) in urban areas for migrant workers and poor in the second tranche of the COVID-19 stimulus package.

She said that migrants who are neither covered under the National Food Security Act or state card beneficiaries will be provided 5 kg of grains per person and 1 kg chana per family for two months.

Maharashtra continues to remain the worst-hit state with 25,922 COVID-19 positive cases.

With 472 more COVID-19 cases in Delhi, the total number of coronavirus cases in the metropolis has risen to 8,470.

A total of 66 more COVID-19 cases have been reported from Rajasthan, taking the total number of coronavirus cases in the state to 4,394.

The Bureau of Civil Aviation Security (BCAS), which is an attached office of the Ministry of Civil Aviation (MoCA), has issued instructions to dispense with the procedure of stamping the passengers' boarding pass, which is done after completion of security check, at airports across the country.

This decision has been taken in view of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and is in addition to the other measures being taken to contain its spread.

Here are the top COVID-19 related updates of the day:

1) Human Resource Development Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal 'Nishank' gave a message of 'Acharya Devo Bhava' while interacting with teachers across the country through webinar. The Minister made two announcements. In response to a question, he said that the examination date of NET will be announced very soon. He also announced that teachers who have completed the recruitment process of Navodaya Vidyalaya will get an appointment after lockdown.

2) President Ram Nath Kovind has decided to forgo 30 per cent of his salary for a year to contribute to the fight against COVID-19. Rashtrapati Bhavan will also take a number of measures to reduce its expenditure.

3) The Ministry of Railways has announced that all tickets booked to travel on or before June 30 will be cancelled. Refunds would be given to all tickets booked till June 30, 2020. It said regular services including mail/express, passenger and suburban services have been cancelled until further advice. An official statement said that that the Competent Authority has desired that all the tickets booked for the above trains for the period up to June 30, 2020 may be cancelled and a full refund be generated. It said all special trains and Shramik Special trains will ply as usual.

4) Senior World Health Orgsation (WHO) official, Michael J Ryan on Wednesday said the coronavirus may become just another virus in the world community like HIV infection, and may never go away. "This virus just may become another endemic virus in our communities and this virus may never go away. HIV has not gone away," Dr Ryan, executive director of the WHO health emergencies program was quoted as saying by CNN.

5) A total of 800 "Shramik Special" trains have been operationalized from various states across the country. More than 10 lakh passengers have reached their home states.

6) Indian Naval Ship Jalashwa has returned to Male, Maldives to begin the second phase two of Operation SamudraSetu - repatriation of Indian Nationals from foreign shores by sea. The ship will enter Male port in the early hours of May 15 and begin embarkation of Indian citizens who have already registered with the Indian Embassy in the Maldives. On her second trip, INS Jalashwa is slated to embark 700 Indian citizens and will depart for Kochi by the night of May 15.7) With two new COVID-19 cases being reported in Chandigarh, the total number of cases in the Union Territory has increased to 191.

8) Fifteen more patients have recovered from COVID-19 in Odisha's Jajpur district and are being discharged. The number of recovered cases of Odisha now stands at 158.

9) Health Minister Harsh Vardhan participated in the 32nd Commonwealth Health Ministers' Meeting through video conference today. The theme of the meeting was- Delivering a co-ordinated Commonwealth COVID-19 response.

10) A total of 1,001 police personnel have tested positive for COVID-19 in Maharashtra. Out of these cases, 851 are active while 142 cops have recovered.

( With inputs from ANI )