India records 2.35 lakh new Covid cases, positivity dips from 15.8% to 13.39%

India's daily Covid curve showed marginal improvement today as the country reported 2.35 lakh cases, which is around 6% lower than yesterday. The country reported 871 deaths which included the 258 backlog deaths from Kerala and 613 fresh casualties.

Some 4.93 lakh people have died in the country due to the virus so far. The 613 fresh deaths reported today are the highest daily casualties reported during the third wave.

The top five states which have registered maximum cases are Kerala with 54,537 cases, followed by Karnataka with 31,198 cases, Tamil Nadu with 26,533 cases, Maharashtra with 24,948 cases and Andhra Pradesh with 12,561 cases.

Around 63.59 per cent of the new cases are reported from these five states, with Kerala alone responsible for 23.15 per cent of the new cases.

A total of 3,35,939 patients recovered in the last 24 hours, which brings the total recoveries to 3,83,60,710 across the country.

The active now comprises 4.91 per cent of the total infections, while the national COVID-19 recovery rate has decreased to 93.89 per cent. 400 districts have logged over 10 per cent positivity rate in the week ending January 26.

India's COVID-19 vaccination coverage has crossed 164.04 crore doses. Ninety five per cent of India's eligible adult population has been administered the first dose of Covid vaccine while 74 per cent are fully inoculated.

Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya will virtually review the Covid situation, public health preparedness as well as response measures being taken in the context of the Omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2 in Bihar, Odisha, Jharkhand, West Bengal, Chhattisgarh today at 3 pm. Earlier on Friday, Mr Mandaviya, during a high-level meeting with Southern states and UT's Health Ministers, had stressed upon e-Sanjeevani, teleconsultation, Monitoring home isolation and increasing RTPCR in States which are reporting lower percentage testing.