India on Thursday registered a spike in single day caseload and reported a total of 36,401 fresh cases in the past 24 hrs. A total of 530 deaths were also reported in the same time span, pushing the death toll due to Covid-19 to 4,33,049, said the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare. 

India's recovery rate from Covid infection currently stands at 97.53 per cent, the highest since March 2020. However, the active caseload also registered a decline of 3,286 in past 24 hrs, and cumulatively stands at 3,64,129, the lowest in 149 days. The active caseload constitutes 1.13 per cent of the total cases, the lowest since March 2020, as per the health ministry data.

Covid in Kerala
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A total of 39,157 patients were discharged from the hospitals and health centres in the last 24 hours, taking the total number of cured to 3,15,25,080 to the date in India. The weekly positivity rate remains below 3 per cent for the last 55 days and currently stands at 1.95 per cent. The daily positivity rate continues to remain below 3 per cent for 24 continuous days and currently stands at 1.94 per cent. 

Meanwhile, India's Covid-19 vaccination coverage crossed 56 cr landmark. Cumulatively, 56,64,88,433 vaccine doses have been administered so far across the nation under mass vaccination drive against Covid-19. A total of 56,36,336 vaccine doses were administered in the last 24 hours, said the health bulletin. 

The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) on August 18 achieved the milestone of conducting 50 crore tests. With average daily testing of more than 17 lakhs in the month of August, India has tested 50 crore samples across the country to date.

Global Covid-19 caseload tops 209.2 mn

Meanwhile, the global coronavirus caseload has topped 209.2 million, while the deaths have surged to more than 4.39 million and vaccinations soared to over 4.78 billion, according to the Johns Hopkins University.

In its latest update on Thursday morning, the University's Center for Systems Science and Engineering (CSSE) revealed that the current global caseload, death toll and vaccination tally stood at 209,222,017, 4,392,130 and 4,787,668,861, respectively.

The US continues to be the worst-hit country with the world's highest number of cases and deaths at 37,148,877 and 624,209, respectively, according to the CSSE. In terms of infections, India follows in second place with 32,285,857 cases.

The other worst countries with over 3 million cases are Brazil (20,457,897), Russia (6,572,246), France (6,611,444), the UK (6,385,982), Turkey (6,138,422), Argentina (5,106,207), Colombia (4,877,323), Spain (4,745,558), Italy (4,456,765), Iran (4,556,417), Indonesia (3,908,247), Germany (3,846,226) and Mexico (3,152,205), the CSSE figures showed.

In terms of deaths, Brazil comes second with 571,662 fatalities. Nations with a death toll of over 100,000 are India (432,519), Mexico (250,469), Peru (197,393), Russia (169,948), the UK (131,577), Italy (128,579), Colombia (123,781), Indonesia (121,141), France (113,239) and Argentina (109,652).