Covid-19: India’s death toll overtakes that of China

PTI, May 29, 2020, 3:40 PM IST

New Delhi: India’s coronavirus death toll has surpassed that of China after it reported a total of 4,706 fatalities, while it overtook Turkey to become the ninth worst-hit nation by the pandemic with 1,65,799 COVID-19 cases.

The country has registered 175 deaths and a record 7,466 fresh coronavirus infection cases in the last 24 hrs till Friday 8 am, according to the Union Health Ministry.

According to the John Hopkins University (JHU) data, India has now overtaken Turkey and is the ninth most affected nation in terms of COVID-19 cases after the US, Brazil, Russia, UK, Spain, Italy, France and Germany.

China has confirmed 84,106 cases and 4,638 deaths from COVID-19 so far, according to the JHU. This is the first time that the single-day spike crossed the 7,000 mark, with the country reporting over 6,000 coronavirus infection cases per day since May 22.

The number of active COVID-19 cases in India stood at 89,987, while 71,105 people have recovered so far and one patient has migrated. ‘Thus, around 42.89 per cent patients have recovered so far,’ a senior Health Ministry official said.

According to the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) a total of 34,83,838 samples have been tested as on May 29 till 9 am and 1,21,702 samples have been tested in 24 hours. Of the total 4,706 fatalities, Maharashtra tops the tally with 1,982 deaths followed by Gujarat with 960 deaths, Madhya Pradesh with 321, Delhi with 316, West Bengal with 295, Uttar Pradesh with 197, Rajasthan with 180, Tamil Nadu with 145, Telangana with 67 and Andhra Pradesh with 59 deaths.

The death toll reached 47 in Karnataka and 40 in Punjab. Jammu and Kashmir has reported 27 fatalities due to the disease and Haryana has 19 deaths. Bihar has reported 15 deaths, while Odisha and Kerala have reported seven deaths each.

Himachal Pradesh has registered five COVID-19 fatalities, while Jharkhand, Uttarakhand, Chandigarh and Assam have recorded four deaths each so far.

Meghalaya has reported one COVID-19 fatality so far, according to the ministry data. According to the ministry’s website, more than 70 per cent of the deaths are due to comorbidities.

According to the health ministry data updated in the morning, the highest number of confirmed cases in the country are from Maharashtra at 59,546 followed by Tamil Nadu at 19,372, Delhi at 16,281, Gujarat at 15,562, Rajasthan at 8,067, Madhya Pradesh at 7,453 and Uttar Pradesh at 7,170.

The number of COVID-19 cases has gone up to 4,536 in West Bengal, 3,296 in Bihar and 3,251 in Andhra Pradesh.

It has risen to 2,533 in Karnataka, 2,256 in Telangana, 2,158 in Punjab, 2,036 in Jammu and Kashmir and 1,660 in Odisha.

Haryana has reported 1,504 coronavirus infection cases so far, while Kerala has 1,088 cases. A total of 856 people have been infected with the virus in Assam and 469 in Jharkhand.

Uttarakhand has registered 500 cases, Chhattisgarh has 399, Chandigarh has reported 288 cases, Himachal Pradesh has 276, Tripura has 242, Ladakh has 73 and Goa has 69 cases so far.

Manipur has reported 55 COVID-19 cases, Puducherry has 51 instances of infection while Andaman and Nicobar Islands has registered 33 infections.

Meghalaya has registered 21 cases. Nagaland has reported 18 infections, Arunachal Pradesh reported three cases, Dadar and Nagar Haveli has two cases, while Mizoram and Sikkim have reported a case each till how.

‘4,673 cases are being reassigned to states,’ the ministry said on its website, adding, ‘Our figures are being reconciled with the ICMR.’ State-wise distribution is subject to further verification and reconciliation, it said