412,262 fresh Covid-19 cases take India's tally to over 21 million

A day after the government said a third wave of coronavirus disease (Covid-19) was inevitable in India, the country recorded 412,262 fresh cases and 3,980 new deaths due to the virus. With this, India's total infection tally went up to 21,077,410 and its death toll was pushed to 230,168, according to the Union health ministry dashboard.

The country, reeling under a highly infectious second wave, had registered over 300,000 cases in 24 hours for over two weeks before crossing the 4-lakh mark on Thursday. The daily death toll too, which crossed 3,000 on April 28, has stayed over the mark for over a week. 

Meanwhile, 17,280,844 people have recovered from the disease till date and the country has 35,663,98 active cases. This means that the Covid-19 recovery rate has dropped to 81.99 per cent and the active cases comprise 16.92 per cent of the total infections.

As many as 16,25,13,339 people have been vaccinated against the virus, according to the health ministry, with 19,55,733 of them being inoculated in the last 24 hours.

India's Covid-19 tally had crossed the 70 lakh-mark on October 11, 80 lakh- mark on October 29 and 90 lakh-mark on November 20. The tally had surpassed the one-crore mark on December 19 and crossed the grim milestone of 2 crore on May 4.

According to the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), as many as 29,67,75,209 samples have been tested for the virus till May 5 and out of these 19,23,131 samples were tested on Wednesday, news agency ANI said.

According to experts, the country should continue following the coronavirus-appropriate behaviour such as observing social distancing and wearing masks in face of the approaching third wave as these measures will help guard us against all variants.