India on Wednesday recorded 11,610 new coronavirus cases, taking its tally to 1,09,37,320, the health ministry data showed. Deaths rose by 100 to 1,55,913.
As many as 1,06,44,858 people have recovered from the infection, pushing the recovery rate to 97.33%. The active caseload went down to 1,36,549, which is 1.25% of the total positive cases.
A total of 89,99,230 healthcare and other frontline workers have been vaccinated so far. Of these, 2,76,943 received their inoculation on Tuesday.
The health ministry said that only one out of 2,000 beneficiaries have reported minor effects post vaccination, noting that the rate of adverse event following immunisation was recorded at 0.05%, PTI reported. A total of 36 cases of hospitalisation and 29 cases of deaths were reported among those who have been vaccinated till 4 pm on February 16, the ministry said. However, it clarified that no case of serious or severe “adverse event following immunisation” or deaths are attributable to vaccination till date.
Health ministry official Vinod Kumar Paul, who heads a government panel on vaccine strategy, said that India will increase the number of vaccination sites by up to five times after administering nearly 90 lakh shots in a month, reported Reuters.
The ongoing vaccination of frontline workers has taught India how to scale up the campaign, Paul told a news conference. “This learning will be of great use,” he added. “We are currently running 10,000-11,000 immunisation sessions. We will do four to five times of that when we start the next phase; wait for the pace to pick up.”
Meanwhile, the health ministry said that as many as 18 states and Union Territories did not report any Covid-related death in the last 24 hours.
Amid a sharp rise in daily coronavirus cases, Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray on Tuesday directed authorities to take strict measures to enforce guidelines to tackle the pandemic. Thackeray also warned citizens to follow the rules or be prepared to face another round of lockdown.
In contrast, Delhi recorded 94 new cases on Wednesday, which was the lowest in over nine months, PTI reported. One fatality was also registered, taking the toll in the city to 10,894. The Capital had recorded 96 coronavirus cases on January 27, which was the lowest then in over nine months. It was also the first time that the daily cases were below 100 in that month.
Globally, the coronavirus has infected more than 10.94 crore people and killed over 24.18 lakh, according to John Hopkins University. Over 6.15 crore people have recovered from the infection in the world.
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