Covid-19: India logs 45,352 more cases

India's Covid chart showed improvement on Friday, with the country recording 45,352 cases, a drop of 3.6 per cent from Thursday, reports NDTV.

About 366 deaths were recorded during the period, according to the Health Ministry.

Kerala contributed 32,097 new Covid-19 infections and 188 deaths in the past 24 hours. The test positivity rate was found to be 18.41 per cent after testing of 1,74,307 samples in the last 24 hours, according to a state government release. 

No death due to the virus was recorded in Delhi for the second consecutive day on Thursday, while 39 fresh cases of the infection were reported with a positivity rate of 0.06 per cent, according to the city health department.

This is the 21st time since the second wave of the pandemic hit the national capital that zero fatality due to the viral disease was logged in a day.

Active cases constitute 1.22 per cent of total cases, while the national Covid-19 recovery rate stands 97.45 per cent, the Union Health Ministry said. The daily positivity rate now stands at 2.72 per cent.

The cumulative Covid-19 vaccine doses administered in the country crossed the 67 crore mark. India has been running the largest vaccination drive against Covid-19 since January 16 this year.

A new variant - C.1.2 - first detected in South Africa in May - has become the new cause for worry in the middle of a Delta-driven surge in many countries. Scientists say the strain may have a greater ability to evade antibodies that protect the body.

The development has forced India to revise its guideline to include visitors from seven more countries - South Africa, Bangladesh, Botswana, China, Mauritius, New Zealand, Zimbabwe - to carry a negative RT-PCR result not older than 72 hours on arrival. Earlier, the rule was only applicable for arrivals from the UK, Europe and the Middle East.

India is still not out of the woods when it comes to the second wave of Covid-19 and people should celebrate festivals like Diwali, Eid, Navratri and Ganesh Chaturthi at home without gathering in large numbers, the Health Ministry said on Thursday.

Patients who have contracted coronavirus have been found to have damage to kidney, a study found. Even non-hospitalized patients with no renal problems have almost a twofold higher risk of developing end-stage kidney disease, compared with someone who never had Covid, the findings in the Journal of the American Society of Nephrology noted.