India on Thursday recorded 97,894 new cases of coronavirus in the last 24 hours, pushing the country’s tally to 51,18,253.
An update by the Union Health Ministry on Thursday morning (September 17) said the number of active cases crossed the million mark and currently stands at 10,09,976. As many as 40,25,079 patients have been discharged.
The number of new fatalities was 1,132 in the same period, taking the death toll to 83,198.
The government has been highlighting the recoveries being registered daily. On Wednesday, a record 82,961 new COVID-19 recoveries were reported, pushing the overall figures close to 39.5 lakh.
The recovery rate has further improved to 78.53%, the ministry said. It said that nearly 59% of the new recoveries came from five states — 23.41% from Maharashtra (19,423 recoveries); and a cumulative 35.5% from Andhra Pradesh (9,628 recoveries), Karnataka (7,406), Uttar Pradesh (6,680) and Tamil Nadu (5,735).
Twenty-seven states and union territories are reporting recovery rates of more than 70%, the ministry said.
The Pune-based Serum Institute of India (SII) has received the approval from the Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI) to resume clinical trials for the vaccine candidate developed by UK’s Oxford University and AstraZeneca.
The trials in India were halted last week after a person undergoing trial in the UK developed an unexplained severe adverse reaction.
The Supreme Court said on Wednesday that the central government has approved the use of Remdesivir and Favipiravir as medicines to treat coronavirus.
The top court was hearing a plea seeking registration of an FIR by the CBI against ten Indian pharmaceutical firms for manufacturing and selling these two medicines for treating COVID-19 patients allegedly without valid licences.
A bench comprising Chief Justice SA Bobde and Justices AS Bopanna and V Ramasubramanian referred to the New Drugs and Clinical Trials Rules, 2018 and said these medicines have been permitted by the government for use in treatment of novel coronavirus patients.
“You (the petitioner) have not noticed this rule (New Drugs and Clinical Trials Rules) and filed this petition. We are adjourning this matter, you see the rules and then come back,” the bench told lawyer M Sharma who filed the PIL.